I’ll be the first to admit – I’m not politically active.

They bore me, they confuse me. For my professional life, I was trained to be objective, unbiased, and I carried that in to my personal life. I don’t debate because I know I don’t know all sides of the story. I don’t like arguing, I don’t like confrontation. I don’t like being told I’m wrong. Some call that lazy or ignorant.

But I have a job. I pay my bills. I try to adult as best as possible. I’ve worked hard to get where I am. I have food on my table and a roof over my head. Stay the course and all will be fine.

I kept my ear kinda open this election season, but not too much because it all turned into white noise. I tried to listen to the debates but my brain just shut down and absorbed nothing. I just followed the wrap up stories afterward for highlights.

My general view on politicians is not the person themselves, but the people they choose to advise them. That’s what scares me.

I unfollowed as many of my FB friends as I could who were posting political stuff 24-7. I didn’t see my first old-fashioned presidential candidate TV commercial until the night of Game 7 of the World Series, seven days before the election.

I was going to write in myself, vote for Gary Johnson or Hillary. Regardless of where I filled in my little dot, it still felt weird, hard, confusing, heartbreaking. I couldn’t figure out why though. I asked myself, “Why do you care so much?”

And now, I’m experiencing feelings I did not know I had about politics. Or the future of our country.

I, like others, felt decent that Trump was not going to take the presidency. I tried to avoid FB all day on Tuesday, and didn’t really check any results until just before I went to a meeting at 7 p.m.

At 8:15 p.m., Lana and I leaned over her phone. Trump was winning. 209 – 168 or something ridiculous. We stared at each other in disbelief.

My stomach dropped. And didn’t stop. It still hasn’t stopped. I knew that despite what happened Tuesday night, we’d all wake up, still with jobs, families, values, morals.

But I know it’s what’s down the road that scares everyone.

I get it. We need turnover in political environment. Break the elitism. Were these the two to do it? We all constantly heard no, and was sorely disappointed that our country of more than 300 million people couldn’t have had better popular candidates.

Do we need someone with political experience, familiar with that realm, environment, and is diplomatic? Can reach across the aisle? Yes.

Do we need someone with business and financial know-how to help run the business of government, which, as someone who works for a government agency, knows it is ALL ABOUT managing finances to get the right things done? Yes.

Are these the two to do it? Despite whatever horrible things they’ve done, said, portrayed, pontificated?

These two have zero reality of the majority of the American population. They are SO out of touch.

I only watched and read about an hour of the results before I turned it off. In a situation when a majority is upset and freaking out, my gut reaction is to play Devil’s Advocate – Sure, he’s said all these horrible things and can’t talk his way properly out of a paper bag, but let’s look at …

Then I think, yikes. NO. No way.

Then the commentators this morning started reviewing his campaign promises. From what it sounded like to me, he will be UNDOING EVERYTHING EVERY PRESIDENT BEFORE HIM HAS DONE, DESPITE POLITICAL LEANING.

Things that have led us to where we are today.

Now, of course, many will argue that those things have led us to current state of greatness or current state of disaster. So, there’s no trying to debate that.

A commentator this morning put Paul Ryan and Trump side by side and ticked off all the things they disagree on, despite being from the same “side.”

It was EVERYTHING.

*sigh*

My father.

For the past 18 months, he’s been saying, “Don’t underestimate Trump.”

Whenever my father makes a declaratory statement, and my gut knows he’s probably right but my heart wants to doubt him, he always turns out right.

For the love of America, I hope you’re bloody right, Dad. Jesus Fucking Christ, I hope you’re right and he proves us all wrong. I can only hope that someone comes in and sedates him, putting to sleep his horribleness as a person and pulls out whatever teeny tiny business sense he does have to balance a government budget. That is absolutely the best I can even possibly muster for finding something positive out of this entire situation. But even that’s a tiny sliver of hope that my gut is not happy with.

The only other positive takeaway is listening to my sister tell me how her 5-year-old son has been listening, paying attention, absorbing information and making his own decisions the past few months. He and his mother both voted for different candidates. Neither of their candidates may not have won, but I could not be more proud of them and especially, him.