I’ve been reading this conversation all day, and I’ve been struggling with what to say. It’s emotional for me because I am probably the only person in my birth family (besides my oldest nephew) who voted for Hillary.

I can’t even talk about it with them anymore. I did my persuasion dance a while back and thought I had gotten somewhere, only to be whacked back by a snide email in the week before the election.

I’ve been afraid to pick up the phone. I can bear the confirmation.

And I look and look and wonder how it is that I came from a family whose priorities are so different than mine. Because that’s what I keep coming back to, we care about different things.

Sometimes I feel like it’s a failure of imagination on their part, that if they could only imagine the consequences of a scenario playing out, they wouldn’t go there. But then I feel like I’m lying to myself and think, no, they could imagine it, but they won’t let themselves because that would conflict with their self-interest and self-image.

What burns my butt most is they are all churchy and I’m the apostate. Yet my belief system is more in line with what they espouse than theirs is. It makes me insane.

And I think, “Holy crap! If I can’t pursuade my own family that this is a dangerous road, what good am I?”

Sometimes, in pure self interest, all other more important issues — like, you know, nuclear war and the fucking Klan — aside, I just want to shout at them, “Yoo hoo people coasting along on Medicare who hate government handouts to other people, I have had freaking cancer. If the ACA is repealed I am fucked. Does this not bother you?” But I don’t because I’m too afraid to have it confirmed that they don’t give two fucks about me.

So, I’m sorry for ranting on for so long. If you’ve read this far you are a saint. I have no real problems. I am fine and will be fine. I am deeply distressed by what is happening to other people and the planet.

I really don’t know what next steps will be the most productive. Waiting around for the I -told-you-so moment will be too fucking late.