What An 8-Month-Old Baby Taught Me About This Election
By: Kassie Thornton
Tags: Elections, Baby, Moms, Growth, Vote

I write journal style to my 8-month-old daughter on a daily basis, okay weekly, okay… whenever I can find the time. Today is is the biggest election of our lifetime, well Edie’s lifetime for sure because she has been on this planet for 1-hand-plus-3-fingers months.

Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2020

Well, Edie, today is the day. It is the biggest election of my life so far and definitely the biggest one of your lifetime! :) #momjokes I guess you could say we are all a bit anxious and hopeful and, by we, I mean the people who are voting for America, the ones who are voting for others, for kindness again (or perhaps, the first truthful kind of kindness that we all know and long for), the ones who understand that there is more at stake in this election than REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT, the ones who know it’s more about living, breathing human beings. Your Mum and I are voting for them. For us. FOR YOU. You deserve better than what America has been living through the last 4 years, or 40 years, or 244 years…we all deserve better. Someday you will ask me about this moment in our history. I know you will because you are already so curious, about yourself and others around you. You are interested in learning new things, meeting new people, and having different experiences, and as your Mom, I will always do my best to encourage this kind of behavior. When your Mum fell in love with me, well before she fell in love with me, she told me she had made a list of all the qualities she wanted in her future partner. She said the word empathetic, and when asked why she chose that word, she said because, “if you are empathetic, you will be curious and when you are curious, you are interested in others.”

Mum and I have a lot of the same values and outlooks on life. One main belief is that empathy is our superpower. When a fire engine goes by, we no longer say “OMG, why are they so loud!?” Instead we say, “Oh, I hope everyone is okay!” See the difference? One is all about you and what you are experiencing, in this inconvenient moment of your day, and the other is about knowing that this moment could affect someone’s entire life story and possibly so many other lives as well. (But really the sirens are a bit too loud!)

Anywho, regardless of what happens in our country over the next few weeks, we will be okay. We will continue to have strong values and will continue to help create change that makes our world, our nation, our neighborhood be the best they can be. One where we all come together again and again and hold the hands of others who are different from us in one way or another. You are going to meet so many amazing people in your life and others will cross your path where you really wished they hadn’t, but they will and they will somehow help you move and grow throughout your story. So we hope you learn to say a gratitude that you experience that person or event, you learn from it, and you make a better choice after that moment by having it.

Wow, I am really getting into it with you today, huh? It is all so wild, Edie. I look at you and all I want is for you to be you. Whatever the next moment is, I will ride it with you. I really believe when you can be your truest self, you can help others more and have a more fulfilled life. I really respect how you truly feel moments and then move on. WHEN you want Sophie, the chewy giraffe, YOU WANNNNT IT! Then you move on. When you try to run before mastering walking and fall, YOU FEEEEEEL IT! And then you move on. When you are hungry, you can get HANGGGGRY. And then eat, make a mess, and you move on.

You are my role model.

After today, we will feel it. I mean, WE WILL FEEEEEEL it and then we will move on and forward. We will keep trying to make “being” better and brighter for you and your future. You have my word.

(Now I need my 47th snack of the day and a drink…because it’s gonna be a long night or week or month.).