Waiting for Something

I came across this image on reddit today. The post was titled “Feeling of impending doom??” but the screenshot is from a comment on a youtube video.

I posted about the comment on Twitter and got very strong reactions. Many posters identified with this feeling and I want to discuss this.

Today in March of 2024 we’re in a particular moment of history. In the background the various slow-motion crises of our age have been steadily pitching up like an over-tuned violin string. Nothing extreme, just everything annoyingly sharp and a steadily rising whine. Rent is up. Wheeeeeeee. Groceries cost more. Eeeeeeiiii. Global warming. Eeeeeeeee. Israel Palestine. Eeeeeeeeeeeiiii. Terrorist attack in Russia. Eeeeeeeeeiiiiii. Trump is up in the polls. Eeeeeeeeiiiii. Can’t get a job. Eeeeeee.

Normies are on edge. Something is about to snap.

It’s not enough to unplug from social media. Some of these things, like Israel/Palestine are really (should be) nothingburgers, and of course the media apparatus is precisely designed to keep you locked in and constantly at a point of maximum excitement: this is going to provoke a lot of general background anxiety. But this is different. There are real looming problems that can’t be turned away from: decline in living standards, rise of crime. The slow collapse of the liberal world order. Airplanes falling out of the sky. Loneliness. These make a dark matter of occurrence that is all the more anxiety-producing because it can’t be well perceived or understood through typical media channels. They can only be experienced first-hand but vaguely and indirectly, like a titanic shift in current in the depths below placid waters.

So I don’t dismiss this feeling as age-related or as the consequence of social media addiction. There are deep cycles at work. And the feeling is widespread.

Add to this the coming election. I am not saying this anxiety is specifically about Trump; it is much larger than that. However, in these next few months the election will be the lens for these anxieties, in that it will gather and reflect and intensify them. It’s a one-way gate. This particular historical in-between moment is real.

In the period we occupy now, we are waiting. It seems that every factor has been precisely balanced to amplify the feeling of uncertainty. Trump could be arrested before the election, but he could also delay, deny, and appeal his way over the finish line. He could fined a billion dollars, but he could also cash out his multi-billion dollar twitter clone. He could again be locked out by an election fortification, or Biden’s unpopularity could sweep him into office with an un-cheatable margin. He could even win and sweep out his enemies from DC, or his second presidency could be another ineffectual tangle. Anything is still possible, and either outcome is extreme. The stakes are higher this time, we’re in late-game poker. The sky is lurid red.

Add to this a sense of bracing for COVID: The Sequel. Even normies understand in their hindbrains that the exceptions of the COVID crisis were linked to the election. What’s next in store for us as we gear up for 2024? We whisper: what could possibly be more exceptional than a pandemic? A war?

So everyone waits. There’s nothing to be done. In a few months we’ll be back in the flow of history, but right now, the winning move is to wait and see. Business leaders go on CNN and make some cautiously balanced statements about perhaps preparing for a Trump presidency. The fed remains ambiguous and non-committal. DC apparatchiks hold off on plans to move either inside or outside the beltway. RW twitter descends to bickering. The culture’s stuck.

It’s like some terribly anxious play where the party’s over and the guests are trapped, but the murderer hasn’t struck yet in Act 2 so there’s nothing more to do than pour another drink, watch the heat lightning, and pray for the storm. I am waiting too. For something is coming.