Lament for the Inauguration

I watched the Inauguration Friday night from here in France with another American friend and with each of our French partners. I know that a good deal of people vowed to boycott the inauguration's broadcast, and I totally respect that and hope that we can move on to ignoring his tweets next. However, I needed to see it. Not to watch it as entertainment or to trivialize or condone the beginning of a four-year mess, but to stand witness. To attend the funeral. No one goes to a funeral because they think it's going to be fun; they do it because they know they have to. They have to so that they can, on one hand, be there to stand witness to the suffering of others (which is an often underrated response) and on the other, to get closure for themselves. And that's how I approached this inauguration: a funeral.

I've been outside the United States for practically the whole election process. I've been on the other side of the world, far away from everything, only hearing what average people are saying via tourists and Facebook. With an ocean stretching between us, it almost doesn't feel real. If I imagine really hard, I can almost trick myself into thinking that it's not really happening: I'm just having a bad dream that I'm confusing with a memory, or that it's the TV show I'm obsessed with that week just spilling into my day-to-day thoughts. But then I remember the very real people who support him, some of them among my own family, and I'm back to reality.

It was my first time watching an inauguration from start to finish. My interest in politics is something that has been slowly picking up steam since adolescence, but it didn't really become the kind of obsession it is today until I ventured outside of the United States, which makes it really just an extension of my own self-interest, I suppose. Since I started following politics in any meaningful way, there have only been three inaugurations: two for Obama, and one for George W. Bush. I was obviously in no rush to watch Bush's inauguration, and for Obama's, I saw clips and images, but I never really made it a priority to watch. The inauguration is all just ceremony. I could watch the ceremony or I could spend that time reading up, educating myself, talking to people, all things which I consider a better use of my time.

One of the first things that struck me was how much religion was a part of the ceremony, which seemed strange and out of place, and later a quick Google search allowed me to confirm that it was indeed abnormal with a record breaking six religious speakers. I expected a prayer. Even if I don't really like the idea, it is the United States, but that was really it. Instead, it was practically a church service. I was as pleased to see subtle and not so subtle hints from certain religious leaders at keeping America a land that welcomes everyone, as I was displeased to have to endure the babble of prosperity gospel televangelists.

Actually, to be honest, I didn't. That's when my friend and I took a break and did a couple shots of tequila because what's a funeral without heavy drinking?

But in all seriousness it was horrifying, and at times overwhelming to watch. Trump's speech in particular. Hearing him attempt to masquerade as a movement for the people, telling them that this was "for them" made my stomach turn and my heart broke for the second time. I had to excuse myself away to cry in the bathroom. Again. It was the morning after election day all over. It's still incredible to me that people can't see him for what he is: a con man. In business he's been nothing but a liar, and as a so-called politician, he will do the same. I mean, am I the only one who can hear it? It makes me feel like I'm going crazy. I feel like I'm watching the United States going up in flames and people are either joking about it (in France, not really so much in the US) or they're cheering on their own destruction.

Even still, I have so much hope. Because for all the people who do support him, there are even more who don't, and a lot of them, many of whom I'm proud to call my friends, are demonstrating and manifesting and protesting and fighting back in any way they know how. So many people refuse to let the ideals of our country die a quiet and easy death, and I sometimes think that maybe this has woken everyone up. Now that some of those who were apathetic before have seen how bad things have gotten, they've finally snapped out of it and are mobilizing. So yes, I watched the inauguration as a funeral, but this isn't the end. Just as death is not an end. It's a change of form, and I hope that our next form is more glorious than we can imagine in this seemingly bleak moment.