Like a nation divided, so is my marriage. I’m a lifelong liberal Democrat married to an equally dedicated conservative Republican. But somehow for 15 years, we’ve managed to keep the peace that seems to have eluded our fellow Americans especially at this point in time. My background is in liberal and perhaps dreamy-eyed causes and insecure professions: newspaper reporter and music teacher, the latter having suffered two job cuts as a choir director in the public schools. Admittedly, a decade in the public schools has opened my eyes to many a Republican’s perception and stereotypes of minorities and the poor: crime, gangs, drugs, run-down neighborhoods, broken homes, perpetual chaos and drama, overworked parents, tough kids feeling unloved and unwanted, and an overbearing collective sense of despair and more urgently a disbelief in education making any difference.
My husband, also a college graduate, works in an upscale community as a cubicle cog within the tech industry. A recent cancer battle meant he would have to take on an additional part-time job. He would describe me as altruistic, the last of the bleeding-heart liberals. I would refer to him as the consummate Angry White Man. Yet together we have seen our income not only shrink as taxes increase but our growing medical needs and household bills escalate while salaries remain stagnant.
We know we work hard. He has taken few vacations. I completed a master’s degree, hoping that might open doors for a salary increase. Still we float along together on the ocean of life, holding tightly through storms and managing to laugh along when an unexpected wave slaps us silly.
We’re both 54 and have lived through many presidential elections (my husband voting in all local elections, too). So during the summer when the political dust cleared and we knew the choice was between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, without saying a word we agreed to disagree. He put up with my ferocious laughter during “Real Time” while I held my tongue as he listened to right-wing radio and FOX News meme about crooked Hillary. Time and again, he allowed me to call Trump a lying sack of *()& to his TV face while I accepted my husband (and just about everyone I knew on Facebook) referring to Hillary as, well, the worst kind of woman.
Working where he does, he assumed everyone nationwide shared his views. I the same. But we were both equally alarmed and surprised at the election results. I was seething the next morning, clearly foreseeing the worst recession ever and bracing for another music teacher job loss. Yet he refrained from an ‘I told you so’ smirk. He really could not believe his guy won. Like the rest of the country and world, we were reeling in shock and maybe uncertainty.
Nevertheless, at the end of the day he offered to take us out to eat, a sign between us that we, like the country, will go on. Over dinner he remarked with a pleasant surprise about my lack of anger or even tears. I wasn’t crazy for Hillary to begin with. She’s no Obama. But I did not believe Trump should or would win the election especially the way he did. With a sigh of resignation, I told my husband I’ve lived through Republican administrations before. After all, the America I know elected Reagan twice, Bush I, and then Bush II twice. Nothing is shocking. Nothing lasts forever. I think half the country had forgotten that. It’s our deal.
So what advice could my mixed political marriage offer to help bring together fellow Americans, seemingly divided more emotionally than politically? First I’d say we win some and we lose some; deal with it. I and millions of people will be watching the new president like a hawk. A review of American presidents, 99% rich white men, will reveal Trump is nothing unusual and nothing our nation hasn’t dealt with before.
Finally I would say politics is not as important as marriage. In a country with a high divorce rate, maybe we forget this. Plus, our democracy allows us to throw away presidents every four years, and that’s how it should be. The people are in charge, not the president who represents always only about half of us. Marriage, if at all possible, should not be thrown away after four or eight years, especially over political views or affiliations.
Our divided nation is going to have to find ways to get along, to not let emotions overrule knowledge and truth, to not take American politics so devastatingly serious. We’re still living in the land of the free and home of the brave. (A marriage like mine proves it!) And by the way, humor goes a very long way in bringing people together, including married couples, because laughter is a product of love.