I hate roller coasters. When I was a child, we spent our summers in Old Orchard Beach, Maine. In the late afternoons, we took a ten minute walk to an amusement park where we ate pizza, French fries
and cotton candy. We played the ring toss and we rode the bumper cars, the Ferris wheel and the tilt-a whirl. I was really good at Skee-ball but I was terrified of the roller coaster. Back then, they were comparatively tame. They didn’t flip upside down, they didn’t have sheer drops and nobody lifted their arms above their heads. But the cars went at breakneck speed and I didn’t want any part of it.
One weekend, my father and I walked to the pier. We rode the Ferris and had some cotton candy and when we got to the roller coaster, my father asked for two tickets. I stopped him. “I’ll wait here,” I said.
He urged me to try it. “Do it once and if you don’t like it, you never have to do it again. You might like it.” I knew I wouldn’t, but no matter how much I protested, he insisted. “I’ll be right beside you,” he said. I didn’t know why that would make any difference. My
legs felt numb as we got into the car, pulled up the safety bar and started moving upward in a series of long slow chugs. When we reached the top, the car picked up speed and began to fly around the corners. It felt like I was about to fall off the tracks every time we got to a corner and I lost it. I cried and screamed and when it was over, I rushed through the park and onto the sidewalk.
The political roller coaster we’re on now is just as hard to bear. On a large scale, it feels like a battle between the light and the darkness and we are being constantly challenged. I like to call it a spiritual trial. No matter what’s going on, the pundits search for bad news and report it with zeal. It reminds me of an Eagles song lyric by Don
Henley:
I make my living off the evening news.
Just give me somethin’, somethin’ I can use.
People love it when you lose,
They love dirty laundry.
The TV hosts are trying to scare us and they’re doing a damn good job of it. I feel like a leaf getting battered by a storm as the polls edge up and down. When I hear bad news, I get a sinking feeling in my stomach like I’m careening downhill at record speed, landing in
the sewer and trying to get unstuck. When I hear good news, I feel peaceful for a moment – until some terrified friend calls to tell me something that sets me back on the roller coaster. I go up. I go down, I go round and round, many times a day.
If this is happening to me, I bet it’s happening to you, too. So what do we do when we feel like we’re dying several times a day? Writing this blog helps me, even though I’m encouraging people to do things I have trouble doing. We all need to remind each other to stop suffering as we approach the end of a tough journey. We need to remember that we are not alone and its perfectly legitimate and helpful to put out a good word, even if we’re having trouble hanging on to it ourselves. We are all fellow travelers. We can lift up someone else and when we go down the spiral, they can step in and lift us up. It’s important not to beat ourselves up for being frightened. Nobody can holdcit together all the time.
I’m fortunate to have a friend who’s not a Pollyanna but he manages to keep a good attitude. I call him when I’m swinging back and forth and he reminds me to envision what I want instead of what I don’t want. My political guru, Simon Rosenberg, asks us to stop worrying.
“That’s no way to win an election,” he says. Not an easy thing to do. When I pick up the remote, I feel a magnetic pull to go to MSNBC and check on the news, even though the ongoing reality show often makes me feel desperate. As I write these words, I’m still vacillating, but I’ve promised myself to ignore the pundits.
Michelle Obama said, “Do something.” If that makes you uncomfortable, remember that if you haven’t written postcards, made phone calls or gone door to door, that’s okay. It’s enough to
cheer each other on, to inspire friends and family to vote and envision what we want, not what we don’t want. I don’t know about you but I want a deeply intelligent, fearless, joyful woman with positive energy and an unswerving commitment to run our country and make things better.
Fear is what the other side is dishing out. I do my best to fight it. It’s an exhausting proposition. I talk myself down by saying, “I have a really good life, I worked hard for it and I refuse to let anyone ruin it.” I remind myself to refuse to let the pain win. I call on my intelligence
and my will to imagine the best, not the worst. Both of these frames of mind are available. Which one feels better and smarter? I remember my mother saying, “Don’t get excited. You might get disappointed.” I remind myself that disappointment is not a terminal illness. If the worst happens, we’ll deal with it, but the odds are pointing in a different direction so lets get on the bandwagon. As we embark on the last leg of this gargantuan struggle, let’s stay focused on winning, not losing. Let’s remember we are not the only one suffering and fighting to stay on track. Let’s join each other in a collective attempt to envision what we want and do everything we can to get it.
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