Truth be told, I had anticipated a long night waiting for returns from the elections this week. When the resounding victories came in so quickly, I almost didn’t know what to do with myself! It took a while before I recalled that the absence of stress, anxiety, doubt, and fear had once been normal.

As my various muscle groups gave way to release, my racing thoughts slowed. I had to pull them back from the abyss several times, as they reflexively returned to doubting what I was hearing, knowing that it must be too good to be true.

But it was true. In spite of my doubts and disappointments, people had showed up for elections, cast their votes, and decisions had been reached. Somehow the creaky old system had done its job once again. That physical relief—the ability to finally exhale—reminded me of something important: for all its flaws, this system has survived before, and it can survive again.

A Lifetime of Political Turbulence

The first presidential election I voted in was 1972. I voted for McGovern. I was anti-war, liberal, and already a veteran of many protest marches. When Nixon won by a landslide, I don’t remember doing much of anything except vowing to make sure there was never another like him in the White House.

Of course, his administration went down in ignominy and set the bar for my generation’s outrage against political corruption. Yet it didn’t take all that much longer for different sorts of cracks to emerge.

Watergate gave way to what now seem like lightweight scandals—marital infidelity (remember Gary Hart?), a history of depression (Thomas Eagleton’s political career ended on that). That was followed by predatory males (Clinton, among others). Those transgressions were overshadowed by far more serious wheeling and dealing outside of diplomatic circles with the Iran-Contra affair, which led to unnecessary slaughter on both sides in an attempt to assert dominance in the Middle East.

Closer to home, citizens and elected officials found ways to corrupt and take advantage of one another. Jim Traficant and Spiro Agnew were tried and convicted of corruption, and both were removed from office.

Corporations and entire industries experienced their share of crises during these decades. There was the energy crisis (remember “odd” and “even” gas days?), the stock market crash of 1987, the dot-com bubble, Enron, the housing bubble. All within my voting lifetime.

The Pattern Repeats

And here we are today, the inevitable at our door, as we go through another set of elections to determine who we will hand over our precious vote to in the hope that they will act in our best interests and steer the Ship of State in the right direction.

Seems kind of foolhardy, doesn’t it?

I’ve even caught myself wondering if we might be better off with algorithmic governance—just program the optimal policies and let artificial intelligence handle the complexity. It’s a seductive fantasy when you’re exhausted from decades of watching the same mistakes repeat themselves.

But that fantasy misses the point entirely. The messiness isn’t a bug in our democratic system—it’s a feature. The tensions, the debates, the painful process of hammering out compromise: these are how we inch toward justice, however imperfectly.

What Endures

I do appreciate the need to incorporate new points of view and new ways of accomplishing goals, but I also have enough time in the trenches to appreciate that not everything needs to be discarded.

I still believe the core structure of our government is solid. Has it taken unprecedented hits in recent years? No question. Can we bounce back? No question. Why am I so sure? Because each and every time we have been given the option to do it differently, we choose to stick with what we know—not out of stubbornness, but because the fundamentals work.

Yes, we will need to recruit different people to run for office. Yes, we will need to restore the moral and legal values that have become stained by cronyism and blatant corruption. Yes, we will need to bring those who have caused this damage to justice. But it’s not like we haven’t done that before.

The other undeniable fact that I am coming to terms with is that it will all happen again. That does seem to be our fatal flaw. Our aspirations are lofty, but our ability to sustain our successes is limited. There is a touch of Icarus in our governing—we soar toward the sun of our ideals, only to tumble back to earth.

The Work Ahead

The work that remains ahead is daunting, but the tide has turned. Efforts made by Indivisible, VoteBlue, and organized political parties are all collaborating. Americans are finding connection and commitment. The need has never gone away, but the will to address those needs shriveled for a bit.

Our willingness to address that need—at the local level and at the level of the planet—is what ultimately will overcome this temporary delusional period we are going through.

What I’ve learned over five decades of voting is this: democracy doesn’t save itself. It requires us to show up, again and again, even when we’re exhausted. It requires us to believe in the process even when we doubt the players. It requires us to remember that the alternative to this messy, frustrating, imperfect system isn’t algorithmic perfection—it’s the concentration of power in the hands of those who would never willingly give it back.

So, I am exhaling, relaxing, and getting ready for the next chapter. The work continues. It always does.