Wednesday 20 May 2015

the aftermath

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The morning after didn't feel like a morning after at all, it felt unreal, it felt absurd, my friend tweeted "Something terrible has happened" and that was that. We stayed on the sofa until noon, until all the party leaders had resigned like in those grim semi-dystopian pieces journalists used to write four years ago. 
We had come home late, made dinner late, put away the dishes and then sat down for the exit poll. 10pm. I slid my hand into Peter's. His friend, our reliable expert for polls and political gossip, texted him, all in caps, a signifier of how extraordinary things were. WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON? An hour later we went to bed. I had decided to nap strategically, to get up again a few hours later to watch the results come in. When I crawled out of bed at two in the morning I felt wide awake. David Dimbleby was still going strong. I made tea. I ate cereal. I checked twitter. I texted my friend. Peter joined me on the sofa. I recited the names of those who had lost their seats. At six in the morning we went back to bed. When we woke up everything was the same and everything was a bit bleaker. All those conversations over the past few months with family members, with friends, with colleagues, all pointless.
After Ed Miliband had resigned I went to work. I stood in the sunshine at Green Park, waiting for my bus, and stared hard at the businessmen. I felt terrible. I haven't stopped feeling terrible. 

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    1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2015

      Polls and commentators predicted the outcome would be too close to call and result in a second hung parliament similar to the 2010 election. Opinion polls were eventually proven to have significantly underestimated the Conservative vote, which bore resemblance to their surprise victory in the 1992 general election. Having governed in coalition with the Liberal Democrats since 2010, the Conservatives won 331 seats and 36.9% of the vote, this time winning a working majority of 15.

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