Finding creative outlets for anger in an orange era
Bad title, but I'm more angry than creative at the moment.
Last year I started planning a girl’s trip with a childhood friend to Zion National Park. The plan was to go in January because I hate hot weather and crowds. And crowds in hot weather? Well, that is a hard pass, though I did suffer 100 degree weather on the lawn at the Red Hot Chili Peppers concert. But it was the Chili Peppers and more importantly it was with my friends.
Well, then in July 2024, Kamala Harris became the presidential nominee. And she seemed to have a fighting chance. I was looking at the calendar and realized that I’d be in Zion during the inauguration. And my friend that I was going with lived in Baltimore and could get to DC via train. So we concocted a plan that if Harris won, we’d reschedule the trip. I’d go to Baltimore, we’d go to the inauguration, then head out to Zion. Sounds like a brilliant plan, right?
Well, due to obvious circumstances that plan went down the drain, and our trip is happening in February instead. And on Monday, January 20th I’ll be avoiding all sights and sounds of that soulless, spray-tanned monstrosity flanked by his billionaire sycophants being inaugurated… again.
I’ve successfully held off on the existential dread since November. I stopped reading the news. And I just knew that there would be time to fight, but I needed to rest my mind, my heart, and my anxiety.
But with just a couple days until The Tanchurian Candidate takes power I find my anxiety welling up. While I’m not an anxious person by nature, I went on 2 antidepressants back in 2020 due to depression and anxiety caused by the pandemic and exacerbated by Orange Baby Jesus. I’m still on them because, I mean, why mess with something that is working.
I’m doing my best to breathe, read books, exercise, and plan my life to continue as normal, but I’m just angry. I’ve had this anger inside of me for 8 years now. Because despite him losing in 2020, he just never fucking went away.
I find myself looking at job ads at businesses that have offices in places like Canada or Sweden, places that have radical things like universal healthcare… trying to figure out how long it would take my 50-something brain to learn a new language.
I have my trip in a few weeks which will be a nice escape. I’ve signed up for a abstract painting class. I have a feeling those will be some angry paintings. I know that all is not lost. The era of fuck around and find out is upon us. Part of me thinks that The Not-So-Great Pumpkin had to be re-elected to snap his followers out of it. I know if Harris had won we’d probably be facing another coup. I hold onto hope that in the long run it will be okay.
Until then… creative outlets for anger are needed. Hence my first substack entry. :)
*thanks to Los Angeles Magazine and Jimmy Kimmel for the amazing list of names to call he whose name makes us vomit. https://lamag.com/celebrity/read-jimmy-kimmels-78-hilarious-nicknames-for-donald-trump-on-his-78th-birthday