Oh my, this week… it was absolutely a lot.

Dutifully, even joyously, we built our Dia de los Muertos altar to honor our dead, hoping to coax them back for a night or two. In the past we created elaborate shrines, but this year, with many of our photos and mementos still in boxes, we created a simple display, using all the affection we feel when recalling our time with each of them. The quirky grin of her grandfather, the grace of a favorite Aunt, the solid presence of my father, a host of fabulous friends gone too soon, all the mothers’ lovely adoration. We left them fruit and chocolates and water to satisfy their long journey, along with their cherished possessions we are lucky enough to have. Remembering our remarkable lineage fuels us forward, even into the darker days lurking just ahead.

We visited the Mission San Juan Capistrano, “a monument to California’s multi-cultural history, embracing its Native American, Spanish, Mexican and European heritage. Originally built as a self sufficient community by Spanish Padres and Native Americans, the Mission was a center for agriculture, industry, education and religion” (History). Today it is a maze of beautiful gardens, chapels, artifacts discovered, and the remains of the original church. The Mission hosted a communal Day of the Dead shrine. Here we set our intentions with the hundreds of others who came to honor their ancestors.

I found myself talking out loud a bit more when visited by the celestial souls. I hoped they were proud of us as we continue their legacy, striving to use our lives to better those around us, especially the silenced and marginalized, those who don’t have the vast array of cheerleaders we were blessed with. Our ancestors encouraged us to keep faith in mankind even when such a notion appeared at our lowest, which coincidentally also happened this week with the election of America’s first felon to be our next president.

As I stood around our small altar, flickering candles and all, I felt their shame over such foolhardiness, their disappointment in our disintegrated moral and societal standards, our ruin of the country they loved.

I know, I know, some of you don’t want to believe anything about your present-day MAGA messiah, except that he will miraculously make eggs affordable again. That somehow, from his tower, he will actually care about the lives of every day people. To me, this choice seems rather foolish, and apparently 67,959,768 other voters who checked the box for Harris. People who believe in supporting public school teachers, those trying their damnedest to take the phone out of your child’s hand, shake them loose from the clutches of social media, and teach them to decipher truth. Understand History. Respect Scientific Inquiry. To not be swayed by the glitter of billionaires influencing their biased feeds. This is an uphill grind, especially when a repeated lie easily becomes a perceived truth now.

Exploring ruins felt fitting this week, in the aftermath of such a disappointing election. Perhaps most disappointing because of the millions who didn’t bother to vote. Those who feel so voiceless that they couldn’t bother to mail back a sheet of paper that requires only a few checkmarks.

Equally disappointing this election is the outcome for women. Not the privileged such as myself, white, educated, with some money in the bank, but those who are riding the bus in the early dawn to do the manual labor we refuse to do, and who, thanks to our next president, have no choice over their own bodies. Women be damned they decided. Instead MAGA fueled the bro heterodoxy movement, best exemplified by their sick chant, which the right-wing activist Nick Fuentes tweeted: “Your body, my choice” (Independent). I cave knowing that some woman’s husband, brother or son is gleefully shouting such toxic hate today. Welcome to MAGA 2.0.

Our altar is dismantled. America appears to be too.