Waiting

 Tom Petty said that the waiting is the hardest part. Actually, what he sang was, "The wai-yay-yay-ay-iting is the hardest part."

I'm just sorry that Tom wasn't around to experience the most recent chapter in the big book of anticipation. It is, anticipation, Carly Simon will tell us is what is making us wait. In a world that has become all too dependent on immediate information gratification, the time it has taken to gather and count ballots in a presidential election has been nothing short of numbing. Maddening. Frustrating. Nerve-wracking. 

And I confess that at a certain level, I can appreciate why the "president" has taken any and all opportunities to act out. To point fingers. To make wild accusations. To lie his fool head off. He is taking this moment in time to exhibit all of those traits which made him unsuitable for the office, but he is finding ways to vent his anxiety.

But there is also a way that this election has been a parallel reminder to the global pandemic about time. COVID-19 did not take the Election Day off. It continued to work its deadly magic with all its terrible math: hundreds of thousands of new cases, thousands dying even as the polls opened. And closed. The counting began. And went on. And on. We want to know what happened, but we want results. That takes time. 

Which makes me think of Juneteenth. The celebration of the emancipation of slaves in the United States is celebrated on the anniversary of the announcement made by Union General Gordon Granger in Galveston, Texas that slavery had ended. This announcement came two and a half years after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, disproving once and for all the notion that "good news travels fast."

So now we can talk more about how waiting a week or two isn't really so bad. Giving us all a chance to get comfortable with the notion of democracy, and in spite of all outbursts to the contrary, every vote counts. It might take a little longer, keeping in mind that microwaving a steak doesn't provide much satisfaction. And meanwhile we have four years of waiting for this moment upon which we can reflect. It may take another four years for the trauma and confusion stirred up by this "president" to start to become memories instead of just scars.

Me? I have to side with Lou Reed. I'm waiting for my man. Or maybe John Mayer, waiting for the world to change.