My fellow Americans and everyone else watching the premiere of a new season of True Life: USA, the day has finally come. It’s Inauguration Day. It’s the day Trump left the White House. It’s the last day that anyone can say, “there’s never been a woman vice president” or “there’s never been a Black South Asian vice president.” It’s also my dog’s first birthday, so as you can imagine it is a day where emotions runneth over.
As joyful as it was to watch Air Force One take off and ship Donald Trump and his family off to wherever the fuck it is they plan to live out the rest of their lives (Florida), there is a somber energy in the air recalling the four years they were in power. This inauguration comes on the heels of an attack on the Capitol, hundreds of thousands of covid-related deaths, and years of white supremacist rhetoric being uttered from behind the seal of the office of the president. All of this is swirling together to create a day as there will hopefully never be again.
So today we mark the occasion in the only way we know how: Glued to our television screens and keyboards, an IV filled with coffee firmly attached to our arms, and the cautious hope that while everything will still be terrible tomorrow, at least we won’t have to worry about a deranged tweet ruining everything in 280 characters or less. For now, let’s virtually huddle together and judge which former First Lady has the best fit of the day. I can guarantee it won’t be Melania.