Leaving the Party Early & Alone #1: So this is the new year
The night before Trump's inauguration (that phrase still feels gross to type or say or think), I stopped at CVS on my way home from work and bought poster board and Magic Markers. I heard stories of people doing the same at suburban Staples and having the cashiers ask if there was "something going on, like a big school project," but no one at CVS raised an eyebrow. When I got home, I spread my supplies out on the kitchen table and carefully drew letters, first in pencil before tracing over them with the markers, to spell out a slogan I'd seen when I Google image-searched "women's protest signs": I Am a Woman, Not a Womb. I even drew the symbol for female (after double checking that it was the correct symbol).
Two days later, I met up with some friends and we headed to Boston Common to participate in what's now being called one of the largest protests in US history. By estimates, there were nearly 200,000 people in Boston alone--a tiny city in comparison to many other major American cities. I held up my sign and chanted and stood and shuffled, but mostly, I people-watched. With that many people crammed together, it's difficult not to. Also, there were some great signs to read.
What I noticed surprised me a little. Not only were the women in pink pussy hats out in full, amazing, force, but the men were there too. I kept thinking about why this was surprising to me--most of the men I know believe in women's rights and were either at the protest or supported it in other ways. I didn't believe, as Jonathan Chait groused, that men would be discouraged from participating in a large-scale protest just because it had the word "women" in the title. But buried somewhere in my psyche is this...disappointment in men. Perhaps it's unfair and misguided. Just because I happened to be betrayed by the man who I trusted the most in the world does not mean that all men are untrustworthy--I know that. I also know many great men, and though I've been single for a long time now, it's not because I believe "all men are terrible." But...still. It's difficult to be a divorced, single, straight woman and not feel disappointed by men on a personal level, and it's difficult to be any kind of woman and not be disappointed by men in a more general, cultural way. I'm sorry, but that's the truth.
I went on a couple of dates after the election. They didn't work out, for reasons unrelated to politics. But as the winter progressed and Trump's administration took hold of democracy with their greedy, tiny, greasy hands, I quietly gave up. Every day since the election, and especially in these past few weeks, I have felt an extra weight, a kind of pressure beyond my control. I sign petitions and make donations and call my reps and go to meetings and rallies, but nothing feels like it's ever going to be enough. I know there are many of us feeling this way. But the idea of feeling this way AND dating? Frankly, it makes me want to declare myself celibate and ride off into the desert with a dog in my passenger seat, renouncing human society forever.
But at the same time...seeing all of these men, men with signs, men with and without women beside them, at the March, made me think about how NICE it would be to have a partner during all of this, to have someone I could count on in this dark, distressing, and scary time. Because even though I have so many great friends and colleagues who are supportive and also taking action, who I know I can talk to and try to process with, when I go to bed every night and wake up every morning alone...well, I feel like I'm going through all of this alone.
It's been almost two months since I've been on a date and I'm happy with my decision. I have a lot of other things to focus my energy on--activism, writing, having entire conversations in my head with the dogs I see walking down the street, friends, family, work. I think I will continue this dating break for the next little while, at least until I start to feel a little bit more like myself again, or until the winter is over, maybe whichever comes first (probably the spring, although I am in Boston, so you never know). Until then, I will continue to wrestle with this familiar struggle of the "circumstantially single" person--I don't want to date, but I also don't want to be single, a struggle that feels all too urgent and wrought in the age of Trump.
Also! It feels weird to be starting a newsletter about dating and relationships and everything in-between at such a perilous time in our history, but it's also an affirmation, for me, that we have to continue to take care of ourselves and "live our best lives" and for me, that involves writing.
A Puggle Picture Bonus for You
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Until next time,
Jill
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