Following our election, many will be joyous, content, reassured while others will wrangle with disbelief, anguish and despondency. We now must reconcile ourselves with what our country has chosen as we go about our lives, our mundane tasks, engage in conversation.

Because going forward is an imperative, our great task, we must see one another as people. We must rebuild our communities by identifying commonalities, extending olive branches and presenting ourselves as persons with names and families who shop and tend to yards and make dinner, and reinvigorate a shared investment in caring for those in our proximity. We must rest, steep ourselves in what resonates with our souls and spend time in our version of meditative practices, be that walking in the woods, sculpting pottery, fixing a car or making a table. In the stillness, answers come.

Then, folks, then, should you feel so moved, then we push forth, recalibrate, rededicate ourselves. In the coming weeks we will solidify our networks and gird ourselves for the times to come, and we do so in the company of amazing humans with whom it is my privilege to now take increased devotion to our cause.

We remain the United States of America and we hold the light of her promise in our hands.

Mia Marietta
Old Orchard Beach