November 05, 2004
THE FORCE
I'm not gonna try and smooth it over.
It's bad.
I don't know what exactly to say about it, or to do about it.
It feels like there's practically nothing that I can do about it.
Here's the only thing that I can think of so far:
DON'T TUNE OUT.
a. don't pretend that it's not as bad as it is.
b. don't just quit thinking about it.
c. don't move to France or Canada.
Just know it. We have another four years of a president that I don't like, don't trust, and actually feel a fear for in my body. It feels bad.
But, I'm, uh, gonna keep feeling it. I think it's what I need to do.
Not at a level, which makes me unable to function. Just enough to keep me in reality. It's real, and I want to be a part of reality. I want to keep it real.
Keep it real: go to the party,
and keep on feeling it.
One of the things that makes me want to just quit thinking about all the stuff, the world affairs stuff, is that I feel so powerless.
So powerless to ever do any kind of thing to effect any of it.
I get this sense that if I am going to be politically responsible I'll have to go join some kind of street canvassing team and wear an ugly shirt and start harassing people to donate money to the democratic party, or turn crusty and wear a political patch.
And anhh my chest sinks with the feeling of how pointless and ineffective that all seems, and then I just think, "uuughh. I'd really rather just watch MTV. I'm just going to watch MTV. Or a dating show. I don't care. I want a cute new dress."
When I start on that trail, I can get pretty far with it,
"oh, dude, whatever. It doesn't really even matter. It'll be fine."
"It's cool. Whatever."
Does it matter?
Under it all, my deepest hunch is, um (whispered under the sheets), "yes. It matters."
Get this: I think that we don't have to worry about it all right this second.
Just stay alert and tuned in. Just feel it.
I think if we can do this, if we can keep feeling it, then there will come a moment when we will know exactly what to do. Imagine a pun falling out of your mouth before you get the chance to even think about it. That has happened to me once or twice, and it's always so much funnier than if I had tried to plan it.
"FEELING IT"
doesn't mean:
dying under the weight of it
shouting or talking in angry voices about how much of a goon that man is
yelling in the streets
it might mean:
Knowing that it's wrong.
It's wrong.
Confidently and very calmly hanging onto this understanding.
Having the facts gracefully on hand inside of my mind.
(For example: he put the Patriot Act into place, which allows for my house to be searched without a warrant and without my ever knowing it. Or for the government to force librarians to report on the books that I have checked out. For example).
Not getting confused or insecure about my perception of what it real: the administration started wars against people who did nothing to us. Nothing. Check the facts. They didn't threaten us. Check it out.
I want to be calm about it like the way that my mother is when she is actually very angry with me, angrier than yelling, soberly, deadly angry. She gets filled with a weight that I know can't be charmed away. The kind of anger that informs me that now I'm going to have to deal with reality.
I'm going to get a copy of the Patriot Act.
I met kids last night at Oberlin (in Ohio) who stood in line for five hours to vote. Lots of them.
We are going to figure it out. We will have to pull ourselves together and be a lot smarter, and more healthy, and effective, and in touch with the force than we have been. It sucks a little bit, because we will have to work harder, and probably give up some of the things that we liked. Laziness? The luxury of getting to trust that everything will be okay, even if we just coast along and do nothing in particular to make it so? Um, getting to sort of trust our leaders a little bit?
But, as I am writing this, I realize that, well, "wiser", "more efficient", "more totally on top of it", those are all the things that I have wanted to be anyways.
I want to have the brilliant wave of the cosmic forces coursing through my arms and inner organs. I WANT IT.
I want to roll with it. Wherever it takes me.
There will be sacrifices. I can deal. I figure out how to, little by little.
But the main thing is don't lose your sensations, your sensitivity, your sense that it matters.
Once they get that out of you, they really have you.
We can do this. I promise. Just hang on tight.
Love,
khaela
Posted @ 12:33 AM
khaela, that really helped me a lot. i've been finding it very hard to stay focused or positive since the election and this helped me see the light a bit again. thank you.
ps: I have pictures from the milwaukee show on my livejournal, its: http://www.livejournal.com/users/mathwontmissyou
Posted by: eryn at November 6, 2004 09:50 PM
I somehow have a feeling that this president might self-destruct. We have to be there and constantly talk with people and spread the word so people can wake up. I think we need to keep talking with people who don't agree with us to plant that seed of doubt. Shouting and calling them names isn't going to work. We have to make it clear that there is something terribly wrong happening here.
Khaela I will be leaving New York for Los Angeles on the 18th, back on the 22nd. I hope to see you when you are here. I love you. You know what I mean.
Gambatte! ( http://www.kobudoatlanta.com/gambatte.html )
Posted by: Mitsu at November 8, 2004 11:39 AM
hi khaela and everybody else. sorry to post such a long thing but i think it's important. people keep equating moving away with 'giving up' and i don't understand that. i think there are very compelling reasons to move abroad (as well as stay put). here is what i wrote about it on the k board if anybody is interested:
-------
say what you will but i think it's a pretty strong statement to leave your home in protest.
and i've been an 'activist' for years and have been dedicated to my community (currently work in homeless youth shelters, have started collectives, done food not bombs, put on a zillion benefit shows, sat on panels, protested, got peppersprayed and shot at during the wto, blah blah blah) and larger world (doing documentaries, pamphteering, etc). one of the WORST things to come out of this election in my opinion is that we have validated gw bush in the eyes of the world and i think that one of the best ways to combat that (and isolationism in general) is through cultural exchange. maybe canada isn't the best option but how about moving to lebanon? france? north africa? these are places that just recently started to feel like the american people (not just government) are to blame. we owe it to the global community to combat that image here and abroad and to help organize global networks of resistance. the media will not do this for us and what other real means of communication do we have with the rest of the world (how many iraqis can access indymedia)? this issue is bigger than just the domesic side of things. the people that i see around me too caught up in their local community are the ones i see ignoring some of the greater global issues we have to deal with and the people i know who have done extensive travelling (both american and non-american) are the ones i see having the healthiest global vision. gw bush isn't just americas problem and we need *healthy* resistance everywhere.
bush and kerry are different shades of the same policy. most foreign policy decisions are dictated by that very powerful (and often invisible) alliance of global economic interests (not least of which, oil). people can sit in the US all they want and vote for the local green party rep and march down mainstreet but i feel like we're closer to armaggedon than we are to revolution and broader action needs to happen. can you imagine if ships were really turned away at port all the time (like the one carrying nuclear waste two years ago) or if we saw much more global solidarity like we did when the iraq war started?
this is most definitely a global issue and i think we're doomed if people don't realize the networks of money and power behind it and that is one of the reasons i advocate cultural exchange (both ways). because you move out of the country does not mean in any sense that you are somehow no longer an effective fighter for justice. why would it?
of course i'm aware of the domestic repercussions of this administration. i live in oregon, am completely broke and have very little income and i can't even qualify for the public health plan. that is how bad it is here. they said they'd only take me if i was in an 'advanced stage of terminal illness'. this is a symptom of a much greater problem of priorities. i know how destructive this administration is. i got a letter from the FBI telling me they could contact me at any time about what books people were buying from my work and how i'd get put in jail if i told anybody about it. i got contacted by lawyers from the ACLU. I've read the Project for a New American Century stuff written by rumsfeld wolfowitz cheney and crew (if you think the patriot act is scary check that shit out) where they call for a 'new pearl harbor' to galvanize support to restructure the middle east and implement the neo-conservative domestic agenda. but i don't understand why people keep telling me i need to sit in portland (or anywhere USA) to fight this thing.
and yes, of course i've had tons of discussions and arguments about cultural destruction (we here in the 'west' are leading the world in that department), travelling, privilege, etc. but i think we export much more crap (structural re-adjustment policies, gmo food requirements, bombs) than we do any sense of real resistance or alternatives. assimilation is a problem. i just think that if it's going to happen we should be 'assimilating' the later rather than the former. but we're paralyzed by internal debate about the validity of of working across political borders? it make no sense to me.
i think you should do what you can to change things as best you can wherever you can be most effective. and i think those movements have to be networked and more global in vision. my two cents.
xx, themba
Posted by: themba at November 9, 2004 04:11 PM
i came upon your diary from another diary on my favorites list and i just wanted to say that everything you spoke of applied to not just the political aspect of society but in general the way we all exist and interact and think. what you wrote was beautiful and well spoken and comforting and true and i love you for it. maybe instead of reacting directly to raw emotion we can hold the emotion and make it more powerful by feeling it deeper than instant reaction. i just wanted to thank you..you opened up another door in my mind. i love you for it and i dont' even know you...love to you! love always pixieleigh
Posted by: pixieleigh at November 9, 2004 11:51 PM
dear khaela & other readers,
perhaps, as pixieleigh said, something greater can come out of this. though i am saddened that kerry didn't win, i didn't vote for him either! i think maybe if he had won, all the grassroots activism that has sprung up in places that are not traditionally as active may have stopped there, (at winning the election, that is). emails from various groups i'm in have echoed this outlook post-election, but i wonder if the results were different, if i would have continued to get as many emails from such groups. maybe bush's going into his second term will force more people to hold the government more accountable and like you said, pay attention.
i can only hope, and act.
in solidarity,
dana
Posted by: dana at November 10, 2004 09:07 PM
Dude, I'm that drunk metal kid from milwaukee. I didn't vote for Kerry or Bush cuz I didn't like either. But think of it this way. If Kerry would have won, is 4 years enough to clean up the mess we're in? I really doubt it. And second, if GW keeps shit up like he has been, shit will be so fucked the republcan party will be dead.
p.s. 'poor aim' is the shit. 'the sky opened...' is my new car jam.
Posted by: pat at November 11, 2004 12:39 AM
it's incredible how much of what you write applies to our very different different situation here in the Netherlands (a few days ago a provocative writer / film director was murdered by a extremist muslim, and now everybody is shouting that we need to do something about those muslims - and setting fire to muslim schools etc. too). it's good to find someone who is able to stay with herself when these kind of things happen.
i want to thank you very much for keeping your head cool and your heart warm in difficult times, and helping others to do so as well.
wishing you love & strength,
esther
Posted by: esther at November 11, 2004 04:07 AM
does the world just need to experience some kind of extreme? or, hmm....as we (who am i speaking for) lose sensitivity it takes more and more to wake us up. if i watch 1 hour of tv i am in a stupor for a whole day, wih the feeling that my life is utterly meaningless and the life of dingleberry hesserschmitt contibued to society because he invented the plastic press in 1923 amidst a tumultuous interior life which caused him to always use the formal Sie with his wife of 4o years and escape into his leatherbound collection of kant and heidegger. where's my fucking behind the scenes documentary? you don't have one either!! aaauuugghhh!!!
thank god. that we don't have that kind of branding (like the cow variety).
i'm feeling you, k.k. every moment an opportunity to feel, to respond, to act, but first and foremost to observe. to really feel it, eperience it, and be the witness. breathe it in, hot and sticky, black and thick, luminous and trembling, warm and buzzing. whatever it happens to be. and respond from that place, rather than react spasmotically--respond with fullness and awareness and SPACE.
missing you.
Posted by: patricknewcastle at November 11, 2004 11:32 AM
ttmf and km,i think that if we all did decide to move then we should all move to pendelton , oregon or to the middle of missouri or tennessee or to crawford, texas or maybe we should just start touring churches en masse and go straight to the the heart of the beast, get in peoples faces,show them we're real, and maybe reeducate them on the realities of the "america" that we all know and love.
if we are not talking directly to "them" then were only talking to ourselves.
p.s.the last blow/y.a.c.h.t.show at the halocene was way cooler than the elction of 2004.
keep rocking the "free" world khaela
Posted by: roger at November 12, 2004 02:00 PM
Heyy Khaela (and others)
I'm a very large fan. Well. I'm trying to sound cool, but I, in fact, am not large. I'm just a fan of your music. Now I'm also a fan of your politics. You did very well to articulate what I have been feeling since the election. I worked pretty hard volunteering in my town and arranging demonstrations at my school against Mr. Bush. Sadly... well, you know.
In any case, I jsut learned today that you were actually in my rotten little town (Cortland) last weekend, and I had NO IDEA. This is extremely (EXTREMELY!) distressing. I'm going to try to catch the show in Syracuse on the 20th, though. I'm having trouble finding a phone number for the place, though, and I have fear that it's a bar and I won't be let in (I'm 17). Guidance in this matter would be appreciated. As would you continuing to make the wonderful intelligent pop music you do so well with. :)
-Dustin
Posted by: Dustin at November 14, 2004 01:03 PM
I"m psyched that people are reading this and writing back. So helpful.
Dustin-- I couldn't figure out how to email you. Email me direct about the Syracuse show (khaela@thetouchmefeeling.com).
I don't think that it's all ages. I'm sorry you missed Cortland!
Posted by: khaela at November 14, 2004 10:39 PM
I totally felt this entry. Deeply.
Posted by: Marianna Ritchey at November 15, 2004 05:19 PM
As thin a word as it sounds now, that was really inspirational, Khaela. I'll see you in a few weeks; I'm not dying under the weight of it now.
Posted by: Margot at November 6, 2004 12:02 PM