Not Trading Hope for Despair

It was a struggle to find language that could accurately describe all that I felt on Wednesday, November 6th 2024. I toyed with the idea of calling out of work, but I did not. How disappoint and the acknowledgment of, this has always been AmeriKKKa, allowed me to breathe with so much ease, shockingly. Anger is one emotion that didn’t arise, but sadness and ease both were present.

There will always be things that we won’t understand but what’s always been relevant is the blatant disregard for Black women, our bodies and our presence. But we stand tall, regardless and we keep moving forward. I had a thought, that maybe I should start an organization, Black Women for Democracy, and galvanize all Black women thought leaders, physicians, military, journalist, artists and go to work in some new capacity, but still thinking through this idea.

For the first time since I could remember, I was not glued to ABC news nor CNN following results and media in real time. I made the decision to refrain from social media late afternoon on the 5th. I knew early I had to protect my mental and emotional space and keep my nervous system at peace.

I was awakened by a nightmare around 2am and decided to check Instagram and it was immediately evident, in less than 5 minutes, that Americas biggest threat to its democracy was going to be the next US president and I logged of social media until Friday evening, it was just too much to wrap my head around.

He will never be racist enough, sexist enough, corrupt enough, sexually violent enough to be held accountable for the despicable human that he is but he will always be White enough. 

My brain quickly began to recite words from the late Maya Angelou’s poem, “Still I Rise.” “Out of the huts of history’s shame I rise Up from a past that’s rooted in pain I rise I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide, Welling and swelling I bear in the tide. Leaving behind nights of terror and fear I rise Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear I rise Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave. I rise I rise I rise.” You can read it in its entirety here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46446/still-i-rise.

And then despair hit, just for a moment. Why do we have to always rise. I’m tired of rising. Let’s burn this whole shit down! Not physically, of course, but collectively, come together, for just a week or three, of not working or buying anything outside of our communities. Because this is how we impact and cripple The Dow since we are the engine of this country. But this won’t happen, and I return to myself. 

The only way is to keep going, but let me go in with an inquisitiveness, as Jasmine Man’s has challenged the writing community. To try to understand the minds of those that voted for him. To try and make sense of the 20% of Black folk that voted for him. The White women that rallied behind him. To understand what poor and rural folk see in his promises and lies? And for the apathetic, the ones that don’t vote, to query and ask why, as it must be deeper than, “voting doesn’t matter.”

Let me use my nosiness to inquire more, to expand my circle to have conversations with the folk that are just as American as me but hate me for the skin I’m in or the body I’m in and those that don't think like me. To dare to be curious about how, why they see hope in a man like that, versus a Black woman that would always hold you down and have your back. Knowing they’ve never been curious as to why, they keep wanting to hold us back. Then I read the late great Langston Hughes’ piece, “I, Too,” read it here if you are unfamiliar, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47558/i-too, I, too, am America.

This country was never built for us. We were meant to build it and keep building it but never to possess it as our own.

Democracy won’t save us, it never has, but exploring what will, is how we try our best to stand firm and continue to rise as this has always been our ancestors will. Although I sometimes toy with the idea of retiring outside of the US, I understand that this is a privilege not afforded to most Black, Brown and poor Americans.

I vote for the great and great grandparents I didn’t have the opportunity to know. I vote for my daughters and my granddaughter. For my niece’s and nephew’s. I vote for my right to have say over my body and other wars I don’t support. As a friend succinctly put, I always vote with hope and resolve to continue for all of those that came before me.

With love, hope and tenderness, Shamina