What the fuck, y’all? How the fuck did this happen? How is this real? How are we going to make it through another four years of Trump — or, even worse/scarier, Vance? Because, let’s be real: Trump is in no way fit to serve as president.

It was a bad sign last night when the early votes were coming in from Florida’s Miami-Dade County. Trump was leading the reliably blue county by a scary margin. (In the end it looks like he won Miami-Dade by almost 12 percentage points.) That put a damper on our mood, and it only got worse as the night progressed.

By the time I went to bed it looked like a Trump victory was all but assured. And this morning, as Kaitlin got her coffee, I asked her if they had called it. She nodded and started crying. I was too numb and too mad to cry. I looked at the news and then spent the better part of three hours just staring into space. We occasionally exchanged words about how racist, misogynistic, and cruel so many Americans are, but for the most part we were both trapped in our own thoughts.

Here are some of the things I thought — and I warn you, this is dark:

Deep down, I’ve never truly felt like an American, and the election only reinforced the idea that this is a country made for white people and white people only, and I will never belong or feel like it is something that can be mine. I will always be made to feel like an outsider. I do not want to have children because I do not want them to grow up in Trump’s twisted vision of the United States. That we have officially become an authoritarian country. That I want to move away — maybe to South Korea, if I can get citizenship. That it might mean divorcing Kaitlin, who I don’t think will leave her family. That the United States has always been a shitty place and that it’s getting what it deserves. That the one good thing about Trump getting elected is that we’ll speed up a societal collapse. That I hope someone tries to assassinate him. (And if anyone thinks I’m serious about that, just know that I’m only being sarcastic — can’t you take a joke???) That if I had the courage to kill myself, I would.

There were more thoughts, I’m sure, but those were the gist of it. It was bleak. Anyway, Kaitlin suggested that we spend some time with my sister today, both since Kaitlin figured she’d need just as much support as me and also because Kaitlin figured time with my sister would help me. She was right. Shortly after we got over to my sister’s place, we all broke down crying.

For a party that’s ostensibly about freedom, Republicans severely limit the freedom of the rest of us, whether that’s people of color, queer and trans folks, or conscientious liberals. I hate that because Trump won an election (an election that I am convinced was won by fuckery of some kind — the problem is that when said fuckery comes to light it will be too late, because he’ll already be sworn in, and what do we do then?), that because he will be president for another four years (or more???), then our own future has been blown up. How the fuck is that fair? Or right? Or moral?

I’m not here today to write an inspiring message about how it will all be okay and that’ll get through this. I honestly don’t know if that will be true. Instead, I want to leave a written record of how awful and hopeless and discouraging and supremely fucked up this day is. I know that we can’t make any big decisions today, that what we feel is not the same as what we’ll do. (This is especially true in relation to killing myself — it may feel like the thing I want to do, but I know it’s not something I would do.) I know that the thing that will help us through it is each other — a community of good people who aren’t falling for the hate and the fear and vitriol. But goddamn, it’s not going to be easy. So in the meantime I hope you are doing well and taking care of yourself. Ask for the things you need to get you through the day. I’m here if you need to talk.

One last observation before I go: When we moved into our house, the previous owners had an American flag hanging from the shed on our back patio. Neither one of us had ever owned or flown a flag before, and honestly I wasn’t super keen on keeping it up. But it was in the backyard, so no one really saw it anyway. We haven’t taken it down once — which is maybe something you’re supposed to do with flags, because otherwise the wind and the rain will beat it the fuck up. Here’s what the flag looks like as of 4:30pm today, which pretty much sums up my feelings toward this country: