I suspect much of it is being freelance, and having no colleagues to discuss things with, or to distract me. One former colleague would probably say, ‘It’s all cyclical – these things always come around.’ But – even though I avoid TV news, don’t click on articles on my rare visits to Facebook, and limit myself to reading five tweets per Twitter visit, just to check there is still a world out there – I can’t get the headlines out of my head. ‘How to survive an Autocracy’; ‘We’re *this close* to the European far-right rise of the 1930s’; ‘Stephen Hawking gives humanity only 1,000 more years’; ‘Economic inequality has historically triggered rise in isolationism, racism and aggression’; and, my personal favourite, that long piece about how we’re just about due a massive war to wipe most of us out.  

I can’t ignore them, once they’re in. I can just about manage when I’m on my own, working, or trying to work; but when the kids are home again all I can think of is how would they survive a war/where could they be sent to be safe/would they manage without us/who would take care of them/what if they got caught in a looting incident/what if we all slowly starve to death/what if we have to hide from military forces – could the younger ones stay quiet enough for long enough/what would we pack in an emergency/will it be safe for the kids to speak out for minorities as we’ve encouraged them/how soon would we betray friends or neighbours to protect the kids and on and on and on. The smallest argument between them feels like horrible foreshadowing. It feels like there’s a vice around my chest and around my head, and constant adrenaline flooding my veins. Of course, no one wants to be those characters from between-the-wars film and literature, insisting War Will Never Come Again, but my current feelings aren’t healthy. There has to be a middle ground: being aware, but still functioning day-to-day. I understand that. 

I’d say I miss debates about student loans and NHS funding, but of course they are all teeth on this same cog. Privatisation vs nationalisation: shareholders might be able to invest more, but they demand more returns so workers earn less and less and the 1% has a larger and larger piece of pie. An unequal society never functions well for long. And there’s no comfort in knowing the sun will rise tomorrow – who knows if we’ll be there to see it? 

But what has happened so far, in actuality: Clinton had more people voting for her, but lost the election. More people supported her in that country than supported the President-Elect. This is a good thing (even if the electoral college negated that Good Thing). The Tories may have won a majority in the last general election, but so far have yet to trigger Article 50, and plenty of legal battles stand in their way. France is planning to close all coal power stations in the next seven years; more countries are producing more renewable energy. There’s some hope that major corporations will support diversity and environmental interests. And, ultimately, there’s the hope that you have to really pull apart something that’s slightly broken to have the slightest chance of fixing it properly. 

Again: I don’t know. I don’t want to ostrich my head right in the molten outer core of the Earth. I don’t want to close my eyes. Can we make a rule that a catastrophising essay can’t be written/reposted without a constructive action we can take, alongside it? My friend says I need to calm my frantic lizard brain. That’s true. Also true: across the world, feminism needs to lift *all* women up. We need to build up or reconnect with inclusive, diverse communities. Don’t just click on the ‘email my MP this petition’ box – call them, even if it’s a four-minute call. Go to their surgeries. Get your voice heard. Give your time, if you can spare any at all, to charities. And whatever you do: don’t go and watch a film about impending world wars and mass global chaos.