By Kaydee Donohoo

Staff writer

I really miss the 2016 election. I miss it like it’s a person I used to be really close to, and now only see pictures of.

I miss the 2016 election as if she were my first love and we had a horrible break up, with zero closure afterwards.

It’s hard to picture now, but I distinctly remember that a lot of things about the election were fun.

I loved seeing new memes about Ted Cruz being the Zodiac killer, and how we all felt at least a little sorry for Jeb Bush. I miss that week of everyone liking Ken Bone.

I miss making fun of the logic of Trump supporters, because they were being really stupid and weren’t a threat yet.

I miss watching debates in lounges with different groups of people and live tweeting.

I miss putting all my hope and energy into the Bernie campaigning, and then slowly… very slowly becoming okay with Hillary Clinton winning the presidency.

I miss being excited before election day because that was it! The first female president! I was going to call all my sisters as soon as we found out, and pretend like I was the sole bearer of news.

I miss picking out a patriotic election day outfit, and seeing selfies with “nasty woman” attached.

I miss walking up the staircase in the library that day and physically stopping for a moment after realizing, “Huh, I’ve been really happy lately.” Then moving along before vague thoughts of “this means something bad is coming” could follow me.

I miss when we were all interested in politics and informed and optimistic. I miss forming new communities around this.

I miss when something the president did wasn’t a terrifying news notification that preceded the thought, “Wait, what? Where are the checks and balances?”

Mostly I miss that throughout the 2016 election, we all thought that it was all going to be over. We thought that we would get a new president that wasn’t all too different from our last one.

We were all so invested for over a year. We thought we couldn’t be anymore emotionally drained. All it lead to was a giant rip-off. The good people of this country deserved better than this. I want a refund.