It’s been a week since the midterms and I’m still riding the incredible high we’re all feeling. I sent off my mail-in ballot at the start of October and bit my nails for three weeks (3 weeks!) as it traveled really, really, really slowly from Germany to Washington State. Finally I received word that it had arrived and my vote had been tallied.
Phew.
Then I returned to fretting about how the midterms were going to end. I live overseas because I fell in love with a German, and ever since I moved here it’s my ritual to wake up every few hours during an election and go in the living room to turn on the tv and see what’s happening. Last week I got up shortly after midnight, too soon to call any races but turnout was reported as unusually high. A good sign?
I went back to bed, got up at 2:30, and then sat glued to the television until 4:00 in the morning…. State races were being called one after the other. North Carolina: blue! South Carolina: blue! Georgia: blue! Maine: blue! Ohio: blue! Michigan: BLUE! TEXAS: blue! KANSAS: blue! I sat on the sofa in disbelief as a blue wave gathered and grew and grew and kept right on growing
And then I went in the bedroom where my husband was sleeping and jumped on him to wake him up, laughing like a wild woman and repeating over and over “It’s a tsunami Uwe, it’s a blue tsunami! North Carolina! South Carolina! Georgia! Maine! Ohio! Michigan! TEXAS! KANSAS!”
Jack Ohman/Tribune
I got to watch and take part as my fellow Americans made history. The last time the country went so profoundly blue was right after Watergate. I vividly remember that year, but I was too young to vote then.
I’ve had a week to think about how this feels, aside from fantastic – and what I’ve realized is I’ve been holding my breath for the last decade and can finally breathe out. I know a lot of funky shit can happen and maybe will. But right now I’m far too giddy with relief and joy and the flood of fresh oxygen in my lungs. I’ll get back to the nitty gritty soon enough. In the meantime, I hope everyone is savoring the knowledge that a mandate of love and the common good for all just celebrated a major victory.
We did it!
NOTES: Cartoon courtesy of Jack Ohman/Tribune. I posted very differently ten years ago. Our House is on Fire!
© 2026 Jadi Campbell. To see Uwe’s photos and more pics from our trips go to viewpics.de.
I am a Best American Essays-nominated writer. My books are Broken In: A Novel in Stories, Tsunami Cowboys, Grounded, The Trail Back Out, and The Taste of Your Name. Recent awards include F
Follow this link for my books: Amazon.com.