The grip on my dreams just got tighter

When blogging was a big thing about 10 or 15 years ago, a group of American bloggers invited me to join their online platform. It was made up of an international group of women who took turns to add a blogpost in a daily rotation. It meant a new post each day from all corners of the world and over time some of us became friends and even met “in real life.” As blogging faded as a format, that idea also ended, but it has meant that I keep in touch with a diverse group of women from the USA. Over the last few weeks, while they are not publicly political, I have had messages of despair and anxiety about their lives and the possible election of Donald Trump as the next president.

Women in America probably had the most to lose. But these women were not going public because there is a lot of fear about declaring yourself to be anti-Trump. They are a diverse group and so many are anxious about the possible deportation of their parents or relatives, are frightened for their daughters who may have an unwanted pregnancy and are going silent in response to the hatred and vitriol spouted by the Proud Boys and the hardline Trump supporters who are their neighbours. Neighbours who all have guns!

Yes, I have just woken up on the morning after the election. I could put my head in the sand and ignore the whole shebang but I have to admit I feel very anxious while my friends across the water are shattered and devastated.

I know, I know, so many of you don’t care about politics or any of this! I understand! Most people just don't have the space for it. Many people I know pride themselves on the fact that they have given up following the news, that they are trying to live their lives in a state of peace and gratitude.

Global politics can be a turn off. At the very least some people still tune into the RTÉ News, WLR and read the local papers, others, and they are a small minority, try to keep up with world events. I understand that most people have no interest one way or the other but it only adds to my own despair that we are all far too preoccupied with our own daily survival to think carefully about the longer term future of this planet we call home.

The truth is that because they are 25% of the world economy when America sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold. Ever since Ireland went through a kind of golden age of expansion and economic progress, we have become far more dependent on the economic policies of the next US President. There is no doubt that the election of Donald Trump will impact hugely on the world and that includes us.

The Trump trend seems to be towards American nationalism, closing down foreign competition and turning their backs on supporting smaller nations. But the biggest reason that I feel despair is that his first action will be to “Drill, baby, drill.” It looks like although the world is already way past the brink of catastrophic climate change, the next 4 years will accelerate this destruction.

Just a few days before the vote I asked some of the younger generation in the family who would win. They all thought it would be Kamala. Today they are horrified. Some of them work for multinationals, tech companies and the pharmaceutical industry, the direct result of US foreign investment. Suddenly their futures are looking much more vulnerable.

But it’s hard to know which of the possible impacts are going to be the hardest to bear. Besides all the implications for Ireland, there are very serious issues now facing war torn parts of the world.

Gaza is even more likely to be obliterated now as Trump is all in for Netanyahu. Ukrainians living here express their despair at the relationship between Trump and Putin and what he meant when he said that the war would be finished within 24 hours of intervention? Trump loves other dictators like Putin and whatever happens Europe is looking increasingly outside the loop when it comes to managing the borders along the eastern edge.

My own family in Sweden are now literally living up against the Russian border. Along with Finland, Sweden has joined NATO. Will we? I think we would if we weren’t a tiny island out in the Atlantic rather than in the heart of mainland Europe.

Watching world events from afar probably leaves us feeling even more like the tiny powerless little ants that we humans are in the greater scale of things. I read that once again Ireland is in the top three of the world's safest places to live. We have come a long way since the first TDs elected after the Civil War went into the Dail carrying their weapons. Living in a quiet backwater now has its advantages.

And so I look around for some hope and see a post from Chris Packham the environmentalist.

“Things have just got a lot more difficult. I had no control over what just happened . None. But I do have control over how I will react to it . And I am not going to give up on the beautiful and the good , the grip on my dreams just got tighter.”