Kyle City Limits
by BRENDA STEWART
Just about the time I’d get my sea legs back underneath me and my focus had mercifully wandered, someone would call or drop by or snag me in the grocery store and say “Hey, what about that election? What a surprise, huh? How’s everybody doing?” and I’d crater right back into the abyss. It didn’t seem fair, though, that they could just casually knock the new scab off and then saunter away aimlessly to sniff and thump melons.
This election hit me harder than most. Although an optimist by nature, I also keep an eye on the candidates and am aware of the general feeling leading up to voting day. So far, I’ve rarely been wrong, although at times I wish I would have been. And I am quite certain that I have never been this wrong. If it hadn’t been for the resiliency of Doggett and the miracle of ACC arising from the ashes, I would have been batting close to zero.
As the polls closed last Tuesday night, the pundits kept referring to a political tsunami, and I could certainly relate to the analogy, but on a completely personal level. It was as if I had been in the ocean, reckoning with the power of the waves, but keeping my wits about me, and then wham, I got blind sided. I didn’t see it coming and it knocked the sense out of me. When I finally surfaced I was enraged and felt betrayed.
Writing my (absolutely unprintable) column late that night, I was spitting bullets about those Republicans throwing the baby out with the bath water, leveraging a voting acuity on par with operating a one-armed bandit in Reno. I could not wrap my mind around the fact that Ken Mercer, the most recent State Board of Education member responsible for ensuring that Texas continued to be the national butt of late night talk show jokes, would be again allowed to torment our sanity.
Their “sweep the bums out” credo seemed to override our children’s and grandchildren’s chance at an education based on science. This was victory? I couldn’t shake the vision of dolphins thrashing about in tuna nets, while steely-eyed profiteers sped away with their spoils.
Then the sun rose and in the light of day I realized that I wasn’t angry any more, just numb and listless and incredibly sad. Although it’s obvious that I do get a bit jaded being so close to the political frenzy in the months leading up to election day, this vantage point also allows me some insight into the sweat equity and sheer passion and determination that goes into some of these local races.
On Wednesday, I mourned the defeat of several incredible candidates and pondered the impact their absence would have on our county. It was a long day.
But slowly, I reconciled the reality and came to the simplistic conclusion that the cards have been shuffled and we’ve all been dealt a new hand. How we play it is up to us. The Republican strategy trumped ours and although I concede that we were defeated, I can’t be too certain that they were victorious.
Unfortunately, along with some obvious keepers, some horrifically unqualified placeholders got swept into office. It’s going to be up us to rein them in, attempt to educate them and force them to represent us. The sane us. Not the partisan us.
At the risk of sounding melodramatic, throughout this process I kept feeling like a case-study for psychoanalyst Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief which I studied in college. And although her work was directed at folks who were dying (see, I told you it gets kind of wack) I watched myself progress through most of them like clockwork, as the election results sank in.
I surely was in deep denial (“this can’t be happening”). Then I got incredibly angry (“why is this happening?”) followed by that abyss (“I don’t even care that this is happening”). Fortunately, the final stage is acceptance. And that’s where I am, or at least heading.
And through it all, I keep hearing Molly Ivins laughing out loud at this circus we call Texas politics, and reminding me, “ya gotta dance with the one that brung ya”. And I guess she’s right. So, let’s dance.
