Arielle Silver
  • Music
  • Yoga
  • Writing
  • Blog

You've Changed.

2/17/2017

0 Comments

 
Yet another ad for another t-shirt with another feminist or empowerment statement has popped up in my newsfeed, and again I find myself considering buying it. I haven't plunked down any money, because I'm not generally one for t-shirts or, for that matter, clothes shopping, but this has become an almost daily consideration. Today I wondered how my personal style would change if I actually got all those shirts and wore a different one each day. I don't know if my office would allow it, but maybe. It seems that there are enough ads to keep me in new shirts for at least half a month, and I like to think the profits support the cause. I could always throw a sweater on for work.

Today this t-shirt consideration led me to a realization that the grief many of us felt on November 9th, and have continued to feel beyond, was not only grief over the loss of our preferred candidate, our outgoing administration, our country as we saw it, or democratic values as a whole. Those are all huge. The political is very personal. Maybe moreso for some than others, depending on where we each fall on the nonlinear privilege spectrum. But everyone breathes. Everyone needs clean water.

Today, as I looked at another Superwoman graphic hashtagged with RESIST, I realized that there was another grief we have individually and collectively been feeling: the grief over the loss of who we were before. When we woke on November 9th, subconsciously but without a doubt, we must have known we would be fundamentally changed because of the election outcome. Change, the philosophers, yogis, and psychologists tell us, is the death of something. Even in the best of changing circumstances, we feel a certain amount of fear, sadness, anxiety. But this is not the best of circumstances, and the election outcome has long term implications. The country has changed, and, passive or active, we have changed with it.

Looking back on the last few months, I now see the death of us as we were. Conversations are different. Not once since the election have I sat with a friend and not talked politics. Not once has Darby and I skipped a recap of the news at the end of the day or first thing in the morning. We've all witnessed and/or experienced wonderful things in the past few months - babies, marriages, publications, travel, beauty somewhere somehow. Yet, the beauty almost seems like it's "despite." It's apparent in the things we post, buy, talk about, dream about, the way we answer the question "How are you?". Something fundamental died; something fundamental has grown in its place. Maybe we're all still adjusting to it, and reluctantly at that, just as we would with the death of anything we are not ready to let go. Who are those people who post so many negative news stories? Who are those people who wear t-shirts?

Oh, me.

You.

We've changed. ​
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Subscribe to our mailing list

    * indicates required
    Email Format

    Archives

    May 2019
    April 2019
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    October 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    November 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012

    Categories

    All
    1000 Tiny Torches
    40 Days Challenge
    Antioch Mfa In Creative Writing
    Big Sur
    Books
    Boston
    Burning Man
    Creative Flow
    Criticism
    Door To The Shore Run
    Election
    Failure
    Faith
    Family
    Fear
    Gratitude
    Grief
    Half Marathon
    Happiness
    Injury
    Inner Voices
    Kickstarter
    List Of 100 Things
    Los Angeles
    Love
    Lovember
    Love Them Apples
    Marathon
    MFA
    Music
    New Album
    Recording
    Rejection
    Running
    Shed
    Sick
    Social Activism
    Songwriting
    Stepparent
    Success
    Swimming
    The Written Run
    Throw Back Thursday
    Tour
    Type 1 Diabetes
    Valentine's Day
    Workshops
    Writing
    Yoga

Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Music
  • Yoga
  • Writing
  • Blog