This morning when my alarm woke me up I could hardly think or move.
I’d gone to bed at the right hour and gotten my usual seven hours, but i was not ready for the day. So I shuffled across the room, shut off the alarm and went back to sleep.
Ordinarily, I need about ten seconds to come around. Then, and I kid you not when I say this, I tell myself “I get to work on my book today,” and that gives me the energy to throw off the covers and jump to my feet. Not today.
Instead, I overslept, then shuffled around my living room listening to news about the election and visiting a few news websites to confirm that things were shaking out as well as they seemed last night.
A “blue-nami” they were calling it. A broad swath of solid Democratic candidates had flipped a lot of Republican seats in red state strongholds.
It took me a few hours to realize that was why I’d slept like a dead man. We’ve had two years of corruption, incompetence, and humiliation under GOP rule. DOGE. The East Wing. Renee Good. Six year old children representing themselves in immigration court. The reflecting pool. The so-called Big Beautiful Bill. Putin. Israel. Medicare and Medicaid cuts. “They’re eating the dogs and Cats”. “Quiet, Piggy”.
It has been humiliating and infuriating.
And now the people have given the power to legislate and investigate to the Democrats.
When I got that publishing contract with Del Rey nearly twenty years ago, I didn’t celebrate. I didn’t dance around or cheer or show any kind of exuberance. What I felt instead was a profound relief. I’d spent literal decades working toward a goal that I knew I might never reach, and achieving that goal was more of a Oh, thank God moment than a Yippee I did it! moment.
That’s why I slept so heavily and could not wake myself up. I went to bed with good news, and that release of tension made me pretty much collapse. Two years of stress just washed out of me.
But of course, now I’ve been up all day and it’s clear the tension is back. The election was only the fight to put the right people in place. Now they have to start their struggle, and we the voters have to urge them on. We have to pressure them to do it.
And I don’t just mean lower prices and restore the services they cut and the billionaire taxes they shrunk.
They must prosecute crimes.
It’s not “getting even”, as some in the media have called it. Enforcing existing laws is the only way to deter this outrageous corruption in the future. The only way to prevent another DOGE, or another secret slush fund for South American oil money, or future pay-for-pardons schemes.
It’s going to be hard enough to undo the damage this administration has caused. Elected officials must also punish those who have broken the law, or it will get worse and worse, administration after administration.
Anyway, I’m making very good progress on the last 20P novel (except for today, obviously) and will be hard at it again tomorrow.
Contact your elected officials and tell them what you want from them.
Peace.