Emerging from the primordial political slime

By Barbara Parker
Beagletown Bugle Contingent Staff Reporter

It’s over. What now?

I’m talking about the election and the toll that it has taken.

I’ve lost friends. Those who weren’t as obsessed as I was started steering clear of me. And why wouldn’t they? I couldn’t talk about anything else. But really now, what was wrong with those people?

The cleaning lady quit. Every time she wanted to vacuum the living room, I told her I couldn’t hear the TV. When she wanted to work in the bedroom, I was in the way because I was on the Internet checking the daily tracking polls in the toss-up states. What did she expect me to do?

It’s true: After almost two years of campaigning, more than 40 debates, 24/7 election coverage, countless polls followed breathlessly via the Internet or TV, I was obsessed.

Some might call it Post Traumatic Election Syndrome. (PTES).

Those endless hours spent fretting over a campaign that lasted longer that some marriages now are yawning before me like a bottomless abyss.

But what to do about it?

PTES is overwhelming. Sure the holidays are coming, but my new friends – Chris and Keith and Rachael and Campbell and Wolf – won’t be there egging me on. Come to think of it, what are those guys going to do? No more all-nighters, no more fancy electoral maps, no more bald-guy focus groups, no more polls of angry white women and no more interviews with Joe-the-plumber. Their plight could be even worse than mine. But I seriously doubt it.

My shrink suggests that I throw a small party to get reacquainted with my estranged friends. That scares me though. They probably will have scintillating stories to tell about books they read and things that happened while I was stranded in the electoral desert. For the past two years it seems I only read the newspaper for primary/election coverage. Not only will I not know what they’re talking about, will I care?

The friends I saw during those long 20 months? Well, we’re sick of each other.

One of my obsessed friends told me that she mistakenly threw a dinner party for some of her non-obsessed friends and she, the hostess, watched Campbell Brown during dinner. Her guests left early with doggie bags.

Admit it: Ours is a serious problem.

As the Post’s Gene Robinson wrote recently, he and other political junkie pros were paid to be obsessed with the election. What about those of us who were just as obsessed as the pros? Robinson sort of suggested that we amateur junkies might need professional help.

He’s probably right.

I know that I am but one of many who suffer from PTED. Our symptoms are common: an unsettling ennui, feelings of lack of purpose in their lives, a disturbing loss of interest in things that used to give them pleasure. Some might call it “election burnout,” but I propose “PTES” would be a more clinical term.

But what to do about it?

I think that maybe, just maybe, PTES calls for a five-step program:

• First we have to admit that we were powerless over our problem. The candidates made us do it.
• Second we have to make amends with the friends that we shunned. Just because they had the strength to treat the election as just another every four-year occurrence doesn’t mean they’re bad people.
• Third step: We have to believe that cooking a real meal for our families can help restore us to sanity. Admit it: It would be nice to sit at the table again.
• Fourth, we must tackle that mountain of laundry that we’ve been stumbling over for far too long. How nice it would be to have fresh smelling linens on the bed.
• Finally after we have mastered the first four steps, we need to spread the message to others afflicted with PTES. Let them know we feel their pain and that together we can lick our problem.

And don’t forget to call the cleaning lady.

Beagletown Bugle all rights reserved (to the author). The Beagle is happy and proud to pick up the scraps off the Washington Post Style section dinner table.