I don't know what to say, but this moment seems desperate for words to make sense of the senseless.

And maybe it's only me who needs the words?

2020 is a cruel master.

I refuse to call this tyrannical disaster by any female designation. It is no mistress.

It is everything wrong with society, wrapped up in a messy, hateful, stupidity-fueled bow.

All week I had the sense of mourning.

Like a real death. Like when my father died.

Down to the foggy disconnectedness of shock and sadness that came with his passing.

I am mourning.

In part, I'm grieving for all those passed exit ramps.

We could have stopped this so much earlier.

When the GOP voted to let Trump stay in office, that was really the final guardrail of the three branches.

And now I'm so tired, and you're so tired, and we're mourning--genuine grief--and it's hard to fight.

But when the hardest fights are coming, I don't think most people are prepared.

Most people are exhausted. Most people are scared.

And while the March on Washington was in the air today, my heart lives in the AIDS crisis:

Their fight was no greater or lesser than any other fight for justice and freedom, and succor.

But they fought with flourish and panache. Verve. Feather boas. Personal joy. Joy in difference, not in sameness.

And we must find the brightness and color and flair and bring it when we're so low.

That even during a pandemic (See: AIDS crisis), we must find ways to lift others.

To be the shining force that brings a slice of joy.

To be the most exceptional you, with all your gifts and flaws, and love for this complex, messed-up, completely dysfunctional country.

Because we do NOT love the system, but we love its people.

Each bodega and mosque.

Each gay nightclub.

Every single taco truck.

All the beautiful land, and all the seedy bars.

Block parties and neighborhoods and all the people who suffer even worse than ourselves.

We love the pastiche of our wild and nutty cultural heritages.

Different in every way, but shared.

Sometimes uncomfortably, but SHARED.

I genuinely don't know what happens next, which is another part of my grief.

I've always had a calculus for what happened "next."

We've passed them all, and now we're off the map.

Here be dragons, as they say.

But Americans--including the aspirational ones who don't have citizenship--have been a wily, doughty, courageous bunch of souls.

We've been at odds or asleep for a long time, but now that we're in our desperate hour, I have to believe that we find the core of our humanity.

Which is also the core of our being Americans.

We hold these truths to be self-evident.

We hold each other when we falter.

We must hold each other in the trenches of this most fraught last push.

And what happens then is anyone's guess.

But whatever it is, one person will lift another person to fight.

No matter how tired we are, there are always the helpers.

h/t Fred Rogers

And we'll trade off, because no one person can lift us all.

Be kind, be American, be true. Be yourself as best you can be.

We are as strong as the quietest voice joining the throng of voices yelling NO.

Which is bravery indeed.