Sunday, January 13, 2008

Into the Political Maelstrom

I have resisted the call of the current events for almost a year now. I cut out the addicting news feeds and constant background of publicly funded radio stations with something near vengeance. The stream of brief details on the ever-eroding decency and goodness of society was starting to make me sick. I developed TMJ at the age of 24, and I wasn't even living in DC, nor did I have anything to do with politics. It was as if the world were on an ever so-slightly downward slope, but since things were also constantly on the rise, everything remained balanced yet still made you queasy.

The state of things in our nation had left me feeling empty and isolated. Surrounding myself with reminders of that had worn down my resistance to apathy and cynicism. I saw my opportunity to pull myself away from it all, to leave it behind for a while and pretend I didn't care, so I took it. I stopped listening to the radio. I stopped reading news articles. I even stopped asking the guy at the pizza shop to change it to CNN for five minutes while I waited for my slice to be heated. I could sleep again.

Then came the primaries.

I didn't just rush back into the thick of it. Media outlets had been covering the 2008 election since November 3rd, 2004, so I didn't exactly feel like I had been missing something. I would come across a few words here or there about how the pre-pre-announcement potential candidates were doing and that finger in the pool was enough to satisfy. A few articles seeped in as the end of 2007 approached. I left for a couple weeks over the holidays, and by the time I was back, the winds had picked up. I could no longer resist. If there was one thing that could drag me back into the fray, it was election season. So back I go, into the Political Maelstrom.

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