Thank you, Hillary.
Thank you for standing up for and standing with marginalized communities, for being the one who was willing to look the bully in the eye and fight back on behalf of all of us, knowing full well that the bully often wins.
Thank you for being willing to serve, knowing full well you would be giving us the final years of your life to do so.
Thank you for offering up your gifts and talents, knowing full well that in return, you would receive dehumanizing character assassination rooted in merciless and shameless misogyny.
Thank you for believing in our country, that our better angels could persevere and for believing that America is great because it is good, even if that’s so much harder to believe today than it was yesterday.
Thank you for your graciousness and dignity, accepting you victories along the way with the same humility you have always shown in defeat.
Thank you for your tireless work ethic, always showing up the most prepared and with policies the most thought through, which always demonstrated to me how seriously you took the job that you were applying for.
Thank you for showing me how to be an ally, which requires listening and the centering of needs more urgent than my own. I will forever stand with the communities that supported you in this election, and I will try, in my own small way, to the a voice for them the way that you promised to be as our president.
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to cast my vote for you, and in return, I promise to carry on the work that you have begun and I am sure that you will continue to do, because you always find another way to serve, a way to get back up when knocked down, and a way toward an open window when the door in front of you has been locked shut.
You are not crooked. You never were.
You are not a warmongerer. You never were.
You are not cold and calculated. You never were.
You are not a neoliberal or a feminazi or a criminal or a corporatist or any other slur that was used to divorce the woman from her life’s work.
You are great because you are good.
I will forever be grateful for your leadership through example, and I will forever be proud that I cast a vote for justice, equality, compassion, and inclusiveness when I cast my vote for you.
Thank you, Hillary.