archy

The stages of election loss
The late Elisabeth Kubler-Ross gave a generation of essayists a great tool when she described her morphology of loss as a convenient list in her 1969 book On Death and Dying. For the last thirty-five years, stages of loss have been parodied, expanded, and applied in the most improbable ways. For our side and this election, I think the emerging pattern looks something like this:

• Denial
  
• Anger
  
• Depression
  
• Hangover
  
• Stiff upper lip
  
• More anger
  
• Crying
  
• Comfort food
  
• Pretending to ignore it
  
• Fear
  
• Still more anger
  
• The depths of despair
  
• Another hangover
  
• Apathy
  
• Yet more anger
  
• Bitter resolve

There will be no acceptance phase for this loss.

I've reached the comfort food stage. Fortuanately, we have lots of Halloween candy here at work. Over the next few days, I'll be blogging my way through fear, anger, and despair hoping to reach bitter resolve before I get fired for biting a co-worker (I don't have anyone in mind; I just need to bite some one). This might make the tone of archy a little schitzoid at times. You have been warned.