(no subject)

	*exhale*
I've prowled the web today, for a sizable chunk of it with my chat client turned off so that I could focus. What I'm finding is disturbing... more disturbing to me than the results of the election. After months of some of the ugliest campaign mudslinging I've ever seen, months of rage and vitriol, the election's over.
	And the hate still flows.
I can't honestly say I 'hate the Republicans'. I have a major issue with some of the things done and attempted by the Bush administration... but I don't know of a single president who's been completely acceptable to me. The issues I have with the previous-and-now-incoming-again administration have much to do with things like the separation of church and state, wholesale discrimination, and attempts to ram those prejudices down the throats of everyone who lives here in the U.S. They're more serious than the grievances I've had with other presidents, at least to my mind, but hate is not what burdens my heart.
	It's fear.
Fear that, with four more years to play in, attempts to engrave the marginalizaton of every non-Christian American will resume with more success than past attempts. Fear that the war-inclined individuals within Bush's cabinet will again get his ear. Fear that the divisiveness now present among the citizens of the country will escalate to violence and turn us against each other.
	Fear that the hate is now etched so deeply that it won't abate.
I've made no secret of my desire to pry Bush out of office, but just as I'm stuck -here-, we're stuck with a second term. The task now is to make the best of what's there; giving up is anathema to me. It wasn't enough armor to keep my spirits from plummeting as I scanned news pages and activist group postings, though, staring at the viciousness and ill intent with growing horror. There doesn't seem to be a lot of 'well, this is the answer we got, now let's see what we can make of it' sentiment. I've seen a half dozen pages of people calling for armed rebellion...
	Because everyone knows what we need is another war to bring us all together, right?
The post I made previously, with the Election Pledge and my thoughts on it, was intended to be an elaboration of the 'see what we can make of it' sentiment above. The bleakness I was dealing with in my mind and heart gave it a much darker and resentful tone than I'd intended, but there it is. Many thanks to jhyanmar, rowandoll, articcub, wibbble, corona688, foxeryn, and trajan_lj, in no particular order, for helping me work through the blue that nearly swallowed me; I don't know why you guys put up with me, but I'm awfully glad to have you around.
	All of you are family, along with a handful of others. More dear to me than anything else I know.
The moral of the story? Life goes on. I have serious doubts that we're all going to perish in a 'cacophony of blood and violence', as one website insisted. I worry, yes. I'm not comfortable with the militantly single-minded beliefs of the religious right, and the clout they seem to have via Bush. But I refuse to give up. I may sound blue, depressed, frightened... but I won't surrender. It's true that I don't have the option of leaving, yes. It's true that I've pondered it on more than one occasion, yes. But if I'd thought it were even a moderately serious option, I wouldn't have spent the last six weeks packing, sorting, and moving into this apartment. Especially in the last few years, I've taken to a deliberately spartan use of my time and energy; there's no longer an unlimited supply, and there're certain things I need to get done. With the help of some folks very dear to me, I think I've got my head back out of the sand. Let's go see what's around the corner, shall we?
	[gump] And that's all I've got to say about that. [/gump]

(no subject)

The day has not started well. No, not at all. At 5AM this morn, a stack of boxes collapsed, dropping a full box of books onto a box that contained some of my more obscure music... all of it things that I'd found after the move began, so they hadn't been ripped to the G3 yet. Twenty nine albums smashed to shards, along with two of my porcelain penguin figurines, a vase I'd picked up in Oklahoma, my bloodstone necklace and ring, and three of my candle cups and figures. I sifted the box for hours, trying to get everything that's broken at least written down so that I can try and replace it somewhere down the road... and then braved the rain to drop the remains into the dumpster.

So, yes, I'm here. It's raining, which is bleh. But I'm up, awake, mostly alert. I need to find a couple more boxes to unpack; I know there's at least two more boxes of books out there somewhere. I also need to do something foodlike. *shakes her head* So this'll be a short post. Yes, I know I've been long winded of late. Sorry.

*hugs*