Looking for a hero...

            In light of the recent election and the ensuing reactions, I’m making a one-time shift this week in order to address the situation. There will be more Super Meals next week, I promise (maybe even this weekend!), but I’d like to get my thoughts on the situation out to share with you all.

            I won’t spend too much time harping on the election and process – it was a messy situation start to finish and the candidates were what they were.

There was, of course, only one who truly stood out as evil incarnate, and yet people still voted for him. Enough people, in fact, to elect him.

When it was all said and done, what I noticed from friends and family was not sorrow at having lost, or anger at having been cheated (for the fifth time in 240 years, one candidate won the popular vote while the other candidate was awarded the presidency); the prevailing feeling has been one of fear.

My gay friends are terrified that their marriages will be nullified, or that they will be forced to grow silent again about who they are and who they love.

My non-white friends are horrified that they will become targets – either for the racist organization now marching in triumph, or the xenophobes who blame them for their plight.

My female friends are scared that there is a self-confessed sexual predator (who is proud of to be so) about to take up residence in the white house, and that their hard-fought rights are now in jeopardy.

And my straight, white, male friends are worried about all of their non-straight, non-white, non-male friends for all of the reasons above, and more.

I’ve spent a lot of time today trying to think of what to say to my friends to make them feel better and assuage their fears…but what do you say to combat the fact that the least qualified candidate in the history of the United States is going to take office in a couple of months?

We need heroes.

We need someone to stand up to the forces of hate and rage and corruption and failure and say, “No. This isn’t us, we’re better than this – I’m better than this. And if you want to come for my friends, you’re going to have to get through me, first.”

It’s a scary thing to say, I know, so I’m not surprised that there hasn’t been a single clear voice ringing out throughout the masses saying it.

It’s okay to be scared. There is this prevailing sentiment in our society these days where the very concept of fear is perceived as an insult or a sign of weakness and it’s ridiculous. Seriously, accuse someone of being scared of something and watch their heads explode (but do it from a distance, many people overcompensate by becoming violent). But think about it - what’s wrong with being afraid of something? Fear can protect us. Fear can teach us. Fear can inspire us.

Fear is only a negative if we let it control us.

This election, roughly half the nation let their fear control them – they were weak, they were scared, and they voted for a comfortable lie because they were afraid to face uncomfortable truths. They were scared that their own lives might be inconvenienced, so they voted to fuck over everybody not like themselves.

I am unimaginably lucky to have the people in my life that I do. I’ve screwed up a lot, made a lot of mistakes, said and done some things that have been so stupid as to be kind of impressive, really…and yet I find myself surrounded by the best people I could ever hope to know.

(As a writer who invents characters on a regular basis, I’ve invented some pretty cool people…but none of them are ever as cool as the people I know in real life)

And every voice I’ve heard lamenting the future has come from a person I know who would take in and protect any one of the others.

Every person I know who’s been saying “What do we do now?” is someone I know would stand next to a fellow human being and help them back up when they fall.

Every friend I have who’s been worried about what the next four years might hold is a friend I know I could call on, should the need arise, to help – whether it’s just someone to listen and comfort, someone to lend a couple of bucks, put me up for a few nights, help me with transportation, etc.

I have a hero.

I have hundreds of heroes.

I have all of you.

The next four years are a scary prospect, no doubt about it, but whoever sits in the oval office can’t change who we are at our core, and that’s what’s going to save us. So when you get scared about what might happen, remember that you’re someone’s hero. You don’t have to do anything other than be who you are – even if you’re terrified – and you’ll be someone’s hero.

And they’ll be someone else’s hero.

And we’ll get through this together.