A German Expatriate’s Perspective: Reconciling Disbelief and Determination in the Face of Election Results

There is no sign of frenzy when arriving at SF airport in the afternoon. Business is as usual, like the last time I was here three years ago. Once we leave the highway and take the exit into the Mission District, I observe—safely from the car—the numerous homeless characters. No, not the homeless we have in Berlin, but very lost, angry, or completely mentally unwell people. People who barely know how to walk or sit upright, people who urinate and defecate in public with no shame or any awareness of what’s around them. People who scream and slur and have either a very wild gaze or the thousand-yard stare. Each arrival in the Bay Area hits me like this. Each time I ask myself how a community can bear to live with these sights, and each time I, too, quickly turn my head and focus on the blue skies, the pretty Victorian homes, the lush urban vegetation, and the cool hipster bars and restaurants.

It’s Election Day. Right next door, in our neighbor’s garage, is a polling station. I decide I want to cast my ballot in the afternoon because I first want to inform myself about the local propositions in the election guide. But maybe that’s absurd. I left San Francisco as a permanent resident 15 years ago—what do I really know? I won’t read the entire texts listed in the election pamphlet, and the quick guide doesn’t really give you much of an idea. But I am here to vote for the president of the United States. I voted for Barack Obama, for Hillary Clinton, and now for Kamala Harris. I believe in democratic values such as social justice, labor unions, consumer protection, workplace safety regulations, equal opportunities and education, disability rights, racial equity, environmental protection, and criminal justice reform. And I want to see a woman president before I leave this planet.

We drive to the beach and hike up into the hills with a grand view of the Pacific Ocean. Pelicans soar above, waves crash onto the cliffs, and only a few people are out walking. It’s wild, it’s breathtaking—it’s the Northern Californian Pacific coast that I love so much. We hike down to the beach, and I find fresh New Zealand spinach. Our lunch. Even before leaving Berlin, I wondered how I could stay here for four weeks without spending tons of money. I packed coffee, gingerbread for my husband, and chocolate—things that cost a fortune here, if they are of any quality.

When I hike along these beaches, I quickly return to a world I was once part of. I realize that what I hold on to from this former life is nature and friendships. I don’t care much about other things the Bay Area is famous for, like technology. Yes, some tech inventions surprise me, like the driverless Uber cars, which at first sight seem a bit freakish. I definitely want to try that.

I go to Joe’s garage to vote. Only 75 people have cast their ballots at this station so far. Apparently, many people voted by mail much earlier. I get my “I Voted” sticker, depicting a childlike drawing with parrots, flowers, a seal, and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Tomorrow we want to go out on the boat my husband bought with two friends—a Belgian-French woman and a German. A 26-foot, fifty-year-old yacht, tied up at the dock in the marina of Martinez, a small city on the northeastern edge of the Bay, across from Benicia. To get there, one passes the large Martinez Refining Company, which refines bio-based feedstocks such as animal fat, soybean oil, and corn oil into renewable diesel. It dominates the landscape with its cooling towers and boiler plants, making it difficult to imagine the once beautiful, lush Alhambra Valley, which was probably a seasonal foraging “pantry” for the stable population of the Karkines Indians, part of the Ohlone (Costanoan) group. Here again, I have to turn my head and focus on the pretty.

In the evening, we watch the election results. Numbers and statistics go back and forth, but not much moves yet. I’m jet-lagged and decide to go to bed with a prayer to the universe, thinking that probably millions of Americans on both sides are doing exactly the same.

When I wake up, I look at my phone and see all kinds of sorrowful emojis in text messages sent by friends in Berlin. Of course, due to the time difference, they get the news earlier, while we are still sleeping. I feel nauseous. I consider myself open to other perspectives, other views, different opinions. But I have a very difficult time with the idea that we as humans stagnate, stand still—or worse, repeat history in the worst ways. When we don’t learn, don’t progress—except in technology—don’t grow spiritually. How can anybody vote for an old white, racist, sexist man with an acute narcissistic personality disorder—an egomaniac, a buffoon, a conman? The progressive image of a woman of color in the role of US president has just been blown away in a puff of smoke, as if we had taken a happy pill that now wears off quickly and leaves us with a gruesome hangover.

We drive to Martinez. I speak to our new friend and co-boat owner, Lea, an architect and psychoanalyst. We talk about theoretical architecture and about escaping the stern and rigid, often negative European ways of defining one’s professional future. Like us—two Germans—and the many other Europeans who came here seeking the positive “I can do it if I want to” attitude that is so deeply ingrained in American thinking and can be very healing for a European soul.
The Martinez marina seems peaceful. It’s quiet; there are no people around. The piers are wobbly, with old planks. Many old boats—some sinking, some inhabited by people who might otherwise live on the streets—line up neatly along the piers. The refinery lies behind us; the view in front is pretty: boats, masts, hoisted and covered sails against deep blue skies, with choppy waters and the typical beige, dry hills in the distance. We seem to be by ourselves. Lea brought champagne and sandwiches; I baked a cake. The two of them get to work on small chores to fix up the boat. I lie in the sun on the aft deck to take a jet-lag nap. It’s the perfect setting to forget what just happened. Maybe only the strong winds and sudden gusts reflect the underlying sense of unease. Nobody raises the subject of the election results. I assume we probably share similar feelings, trying to process everything and not let worry, disbelief, hopelessness, and fear consume us.

We open champagne, and Lea and I talk about psychoanalysis—about how wonderfully healing it is and how we both wish we had started this process much earlier in life. We are out there the whole day, avoiding the news, getting a little stoned and tipsy. When we return in the evening, we hear that the Berlin coalition has fallen apart.

What now? What does all this mean, and how should we behave? I think of a friend who always told me that one has to “trooper on” in times of crisis. Is this a crisis? Crises feel different. I have been there. It’s when a loved one suffers immensely due to illness, whether physical or mental. When a sister leaves forever, or a friend is murdered. When a business you built, a project you initiated and executed, fails to find the promised success and again leaves you with debt and a sense of failure—when you simply don’t know how to summon the energy to get up and start anew. When many uncertainties converge with such simultaneous and overwhelming force that you don’t know how to stand, turn, or move.
Trump will trump on. There is nothing I can do about it. But I can try to stand. I can try to choose trust instead of fear, to focus on preserving democratic values in my immediate surroundings by engaging in the community I live in—open-minded and unprejudiced.