Take a Breath and... | Planet Waves for Nov. 5, 2004 All night I've been getting quite a lot of email from disheartened friends and readers... people who have worked tirelessly on this campaign, people who have watched the whole thing with shocked interest... emails from Craig's List from people seeking to marry a nice British or European boy to escape the rising tide in America... people wondering what to do about their nieces and nephews who are of draftable age... my buddy, a lawyer, who watched the polls in Pennsylvania and is just disgusted... people who are just generally worried about the future of their country and themselves... wondering what to do... There is really only one answer. Get a good night's sleep, have a cup of coffee and breakfast, and get back to work. Get back to work on the issues you care about and believed that Howard Dean or John Kerry or Dennis Kucinich were going to make better. Get back to work building community. So there is no campaign to work on. So you, and we, have suffered a blow and a loss -- but it's not one we didn't know was on its way, not one we could not intuitively feel coming... not one that common sense didn't lay out for us (someone not voted in cannot be voted out). Choose your issues and get busy. There are plenty. Let's get real about building our movement: not an anti-war movement but rather a movement for the good of humanity. And for God's sake please quit smoking so that you're stronger and so that you have a few extra years on the planet to build your projects and plans (if you haven't already figured that out). But please: don't feel so bad; there is still a part for you to play, and you can thank your stars that, because you'll have to look at [his] face every day and listen to [his] voice every day you still have a mission and a purpose on this Earth. Let your anger become energy. Learn to cultivate your anger, and put it to work building something real and true with your neighbors, friends and compatriots. Call these people up and ask them what you can do together NOW, today. If you're among the many people concerned about your young friends and relatives who may face the draft, take them to Quaker meeting on Sunday and introduce them during cake and coffee afterwards. Quakers exist still in just about every city and we're the ones who've talked about war resistance and the draft continually since the summer of 1973 (around when the last draft ended, despite the fact that it ended). Quakers are in the phone book under Religious Society of Friends. Or the Unitarian Universalists, they're good for this exact same kind of project too. There are other religious sects whose primary tenets involve refusing to partake in war on the basis of Christianity. Those concerned about environmental issues will have no difficulty finding projects or organizations to work for starting Thursday. A good place to start is http://rachel.org/ . The important thing is to keep your mind, hands and heart busy. Keep expressing your love, creativity and dedication. Keep your energy flowing. Keep living as if you have a purpose and a mission, because you do. Keep caring, because you do. Just because Election Day has passed does not mean anything. Nothing really changes; we live in the same country at the same time on the same planet. We face all the same situations. We live the same lives with the same concerns. An election is an abstraction; life is real. Speaking of elections, however: somebody won this one, and I don't suggest anyone envy him. Just like we live on the same planet and face the same situations as we did last week, so, too, does he. Now we know what they are; now we can read the newspapers and the Internet with interest, and now we know plenty of places and ways we can help out. And hey -- remember what Kurt Vonnegut said, because it's more important than anything right now. Make love while you can. It's good for you.