What Happened Read online

  After delivering hugs and smiling so long and hard that my face ached, I asked my senior team to go back to our headquarters in Brooklyn and make sure everyone was okay. One final wave to the crowd, a final thank-you to Tim and Anne, a quick hug and kiss for Chelsea and Marc—who both knew everything I felt without me having to say a word—and Bill and I got into the backseat of a Secret Service van and were driven away.

  I could finally let my smile drain away. We were mostly quiet. Every few minutes, Bill would repeat what he had been saying all morning: “I’m so proud of you.” To that he now added, “That was a great speech. History will remember it.”

  I loved him for saying it, but I didn’t have much to say in return. I felt completely and totally depleted. And I knew things would feel worse before they started feeling better.

  It takes about an hour to drive from Manhattan to our home in Chappaqua. We live at the end of a quiet street full of trees, and whatever stress I’m feeling usually vanishes whenever I turn up the cul-de-sac. I absolutely love our old house and am always happy to be home. It’s cozy, colorful, full of art, and every surface is covered with photos of the people I love best in the world. That day, the sight of our front gate was pure relief to me. All I wanted to do was get inside, change into comfy clothes, and maybe not answer the phone ever again.

  I’ll confess that I don’t remember much about the rest of that day. I put on yoga pants and a fleece almost immediately. Our two sweet dogs followed me from room to room, and at one point, I took them outside and just breathed the cold, rainy air. Every once in a while, I’d turn on the news but then turn it off almost immediately. The question blaring in my head was, “How did this happen?” Fortunately, I had the good sense to realize that diving into a campaign postmortem right then would be about the worst thing I could do to myself.

  Losing is hard for everyone, but losing a race you thought you would win is devastating. I remember when Bill lost his reelection as Governor of Arkansas in 1980. He was so distraught at the outcome that I had to go to the hotel where the election night party was held to speak to his supporters on his behalf. For a good while afterward, he was so depressed that he practically couldn’t get off the floor. That’s not me. I keep going. I also stew and ruminate. I run through the tape over and over, identifying every mistake—especially those made by me. When I feel wronged, I get mad, and then I think about how to fight back.

  On that first day, I just felt tired and empty. The reckoning was still to come.

  At some point, we ate dinner. We FaceTimed with our grandchildren, two-year-old Charlotte and her baby brother, Aidan, born in June 2016. I was reassured to see their mom. I knew Chelsea was hurting for me, which in turn hurt to think about, but those kids are an instant mood boost for all of us. We quietly drank them in, that day and every day after.

  Perhaps most importantly, after sleeping hardly at all the night before, I climbed into our bed midday for a nice, long nap. I also went to bed early that night and slept in the next morning. I could finally do that.

  I avoided the phone and email that first day. I suspected, correctly, that I was receiving a virtual avalanche of messages, and I couldn’t quite handle it—couldn’t handle everyone’s kindness and sorrow, their bewilderment and their theories for where and why we had fallen short. Eventually, I’d dive in. But for now, Bill and I kept the rest of the world out. I was grateful for the one-billionth time that I had a husband who was good company not just in happy times but sad ones as well.

  * * *

  * * *

  I doubt that many people reading this will ever lose a presidential election. (Although maybe some have: hi Al, hi John, hi Mitt, hope you’re well.) But we all face loss at some point. We all face profound disappointment. Here’s what helped me during one of the lowest points in my life. Maybe it’ll help you too.

  After that first day of laying low, I started reaching out to people. I answered a ton of emails; I returned phone calls. It hurt. There’s a reason people isolate themselves when they’re suffering. It can be painful to talk about it, painful to hear the concern in our friends’ voices. Plus, in my case, we were all suffering. Everyone was so upset—for me, for themselves, for America. Often, I ended up doing the comforting rather than being comforted. Still, it was good to connect. I knew isolation wasn’t healthy and that I’d need my friends now more than ever. I knew that putting off those conversations would only make them harder to have later on. And I badly wanted to thank everyone who had helped my campaign and make sure they were holding up okay under these circumstances.

  What helped most was when someone said, “This has made me even more committed to the fight.” “I’m stepping up my donations.” “I’ve already started volunteering.” “I’m posting more on Facebook; I won’t stay quiet anymore.” And best of all: “I’m thinking about running for office myself.”

  A young woman named Hannah, one of my field organizers in Wisconsin, sent me this note a few days after my loss:

  The past two days have been very difficult. But when I think about how I felt on Tuesday morning, when I cried for an hour because I thought we were about to elect our first woman President, I know we cannot give up. Even though these last days have been a different kind of crying, your poise and grace have inspired me to stay strong. I do know that even though we have all been knocked down by this, we will rise. And through the next few years, we will be stronger together and keep fighting for what is right. From one nasty woman to another, thank you.

  Since I spent a lot of time worrying that my loss would permanently discourage the young people who worked for my campaign, learning that my defeat hadn’t defeated them was a huge relief. It also roused me. If they could keep going, so could I. And maybe if I showed that I wasn’t giving up, other people would take heart and keep fighting, too.

  It was especially important to me that all the people who worked on my campaign knew how grateful and proud I was of them. They’d sacrificed a lot over the past two years, in some cases putting personal lives on hold, moving across the country, and working long hours for not that much money. They never stopped believing in me, each other, and the vision of the country we were working so hard to advance. Now many of them didn’t know where their next paycheck would come from.

  I did two things right away. First, I decided to write and sign letters to all 4,400 members of my campaign staff. Thankfully, Rob Russo, who has been managing my correspondence for years, agreed to oversee the whole project. I also made sure we were able to pay everyone through November 22 and provide health insurance through the end of the year.

  On the Friday after the election, we threw a party at a Brooklyn hotel near our headquarters. Under the circumstances, it was surprisingly great. There was a fantastic band—some of the same musicians who played at Chelsea and Marc’s wedding in 2010—and the dance floor was packed. It felt a little like an Irish wake: celebration amid the sadness. Let it never be said that the Hillary for America staff didn’t stick together when it counted. To help matters, there was an open bar.

  After everyone worked up a sweat, I took the microphone to say thank you. Everyone screamed “Thank you!” right back at me. Really, I couldn’t have asked for a more good-natured, hardworking team. I told them how important it was that they not let this defeat discourage them from public service or from throwing themselves into future campaigns with as much heart and commitment as they had given to mine. I reminded them about the losing campaigns I’d worked on in my twenties, including Gene McCarthy in the 1968 Democratic primaries and George McGovern in 1972—and the beatings Democrats took until everything changed in ’92. We had stuck it out. I was counting on them to keep going too.

  I also said that I had brought a small gift for them. A women’s advocacy group called UltraViolet had sent 1,200 red roses to my house earlier that day, and I had them packed up and brought them to the party. They lay in heaps near the exits. “Please take a few as you head home tonight,” I told everyone. �
�Think about the hope they represent and the love and gratitude that so many people around the country feel for all of you.”

  It was an echo of an earlier moment. My team had spent Wednesday and Thursday packing up our campaign offices in Brooklyn, fueled by pizzas sent by well-wishers from all over the country. Our neighbors in the building had taped signs on the elevator doors that read, “Thank You for What You Did.” As staffers carried their last boxes out of headquarters, they were greeted by a crowd of children and their parents. The kids had covered the sidewalk in chalk messages: “Girl Power!” “Stronger Together!” “Love Trumps Hate!” “Please Don’t Give Up!” When bedraggled members of our team filed out for the last time, the children handed them flowers. One last act of kindness from a borough that had been good to us again and again.

  * * *

  * * *

  Over the next few weeks, I dropped any pretense of good cheer. I was so upset and worried for the country. I knew the proper and respectable thing to do was to keep quiet and take it all with grace, but inside I was fuming. The commentator Peter Daou, who worked on my 2008 campaign, captured my feelings when he tweeted, “If Trump had won by 3 million votes, lost electoral college by 80K, and Russia had hacked RNC, Republicans would have shut down America.” Nonetheless, I didn’t go public with my feelings. I let them out in private. When I heard that Donald Trump settled a fraud suit against his Trump University for $25 million, I yelled at the television. When I read the news that he filled his team with Wall Street bankers after relentlessly accusing me of being their stooge, I nearly threw the remote control at the wall. And when I heard he installed Steve Bannon, a leading promoter of the “Alt-Right,” which many have described as including white nationalists, as his chief strategist in the White House, it felt like a new low in a long line of lows.

  The White House is sacred ground. Franklin D. Roosevelt hung a plaque over the fireplace in the State Dining Room inscribed with a line from a letter that John Adams sent to his wife on his second night living in the newly built White House: “I pray heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.” I hope Adams would have been okay with a wise woman. I can’t imagine what he would say if he could see who was walking those halls.

  Letters started pouring in from people across the country, many so poignant that after reading a few, I had to put them away and go for a walk. A third-year law student from Massachusetts named Rauvin wrote about how she imagined that she and her female friends and classmates would look back on this time:

  On Nov. 8, 2016, we felt a sense of devastation, powerlessness, and disappointment that we had never felt before. So we cried. And then we squared our shoulders, picked each other up, and got to work. We moved onward and onward, keeping in mind that we would never, ever allow ourselves to feel again as we did that day. And though our anger and disappointment fueled us, it did not consume us, make us cynical or cruel. It made us strong. And eventually, eventually one of us will crash through that highest, hardest glass ceiling. And it will be because of our hard work, determination, and resilience. But it will also be because of you. Just you wait.

  In a postscript, she added: “If I may recommend some salves: time with friends and family, of course, but also the first season of Friday Night Lights, the new season of Gilmore Girls, the Hamilton cast album, Martha Stewart’s mac and cheese, a good book, a glass of red wine.” Good advice!

  A woman named Holly from Maryland wrote with additional sensible guidance:

  I hope you will sleep as late as you like and wear your sneakers all day. Get a massage and stand in the sun. Sleep in your own bed and take long walks with your husband. Giggle with your granddaughter and play patty-cake with your grandson. . . . Breathe. Think only about whether you want strawberries or blueberries with your breakfast, about which Dr. Seuss book to read to your grandchildren. Listen to the wind or Chopin.

  My friend Debbie from Texas sent me a poem to cheer me up. Her father told her that a friend of his wrote it after they worked for Adlai Stevenson, a two-time presidential candidate, on one of his landslide defeats to Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s. I have to admit, it made me chuckle:

  The election is now over,

  The result is now known.

  The will of the people

  Has clearly been shown.

  Let’s all get together;

  Let bitterness pass.

  I’ll hug your Elephant;

  And you kiss my Ass.

  Pam from Colorado sent me a box of a thousand handmade origami cranes held together by strings. She explained that, in Japan, a thousand folded cranes are a powerful symbol of hope and that hanging them in your home is considered extremely lucky. I hung them on my porch. I’d take all the luck and hope I could get.

  I tried hard to let go of the burden of putting on a happy face or reassuring everyone that I was totally fine. I knew I would be fine eventually, but for those early weeks and months, I wasn’t fine at all. And while I didn’t spill my guts to everyone who crossed my path, I did answer honestly when asked how I was doing. “It’ll be okay,” I’d say, “but right now it’s really hard.” If I was feeling defiant, I’d respond, “Bloody, but unbowed,” a phrase from “Invictus,” Nelson Mandela’s favorite poem. If they wanted to commiserate over the latest reports from Washington, sometimes I’d confess about how mad it all made me. Other times I’d say, “I’m just not quite up for talking about this.” Everyone understood.

  I also let people do things for me. This doesn’t come easily to me. But Chelsea pointed out, “Mom, people want to do something helpful—they want you to let them.” So when a friend said she was sending a box full of her favorite books . . . and another said he was coming up for the weekend even if it was just to take a walk together . . . and another said she was taking me to see a play whether I wanted to go or not . . . I didn’t protest or argue. For the first time in years, I didn’t have to consult a complicated schedule. I could just say “Yes!” without a second thought.

  I thought a lot about my mother. Part of me was glad she wasn’t around to experience another bitter disappointment. My narrowly losing the Democratic nomination to Barack Obama in 2008 had been hard for her, although she tried never to let me see it. Mostly, I just missed her. I wanted to sit down with her, hold her hand, and share all my troubles.

  Friends advised me on the power of Xanax and raved about their amazing therapists. Doctors told me they’d never prescribed so many antidepressants in their lives. But that wasn’t for me. Never has been.

  Instead, I did yoga with my instructor, Marianne Letizia, especially “breath work.” If you’ve never done alternate nostril breathing, it’s worth a try. Sit cross-legged with your left hand on your thigh and your right hand on your nose. Breathing deeply from your diaphragm, place your right thumb on your right nostril and your ring and little fingers on your left. Shut your eyes, and close off your right nostril, breathing slowly and deeply through your left. Now close both sides and hold your breath. Exhale through the right nostril. Then reverse it: inhale through the right, close it, and exhale through the left. The way it’s been explained to me, this practice allows oxygen to activate both the right side of the brain, which is the source of your creativity and imagination, and the left side, which controls reason and logic. Breathe in and out, completing the cycle a few times. You will feel calmer and more focused. It may sound silly, but it works for me.

  It wasn’t all yoga and breathing: I also drank my share of chardonnay.

  I spent time in nature. The day after my concession, Bill and I were in an arboretum near our home. It was the perfect time of year for traipsing—crisp but not freezing, with the smell of fall in the air. We were lost in thought when we met a young woman out hiking with her three-month-old daughter strapped to her back and her dog underfoot. She seemed a little embarrassed to stop and greet us, but she said she couldn’t help herself—she n
eeded to give me a hug. It turned out, I needed it too. Later that day, she posted a photo of us on Facebook, which quickly went viral. The “HRC in the Wild” meme was born.

  Throughout November and December, Bill and I laced up our shoes and hit the trails again and again, slowly working through why I lost, what I could have done better, what in the world was going to happen to America now. We also spent a fair amount of time talking about what we’d have for dinner that night or what movie to watch next.

  I took on projects. In August 2016, we had bought the house next door: a classic ranch we had always liked the looks of, with a backyard that connected to ours. The idea was to have plenty of room for Chelsea, Marc, their kids, our brothers and their families, and our friends. Plus, I was getting a little ahead of myself and thinking about how to accommodate the large team that travels with a President. Through September and October, we had been quietly remodeling, but with the campaign in high gear, there hadn’t been much time to think about any of that. Now I had nothing but time on my hands. I spent hours going over plans with the contractor and my interior decorator and friend Rosemarie Howe: paint swatches, furniture, a swing set for the backyard. Over the fireplace, I hung a vintage suffragette banner that Marc had given me that declared “Votes for Women.” In the family room, we put up a colorful painting of the balloon drop at the Democratic National Convention. Bill and I had both gotten a kick out of those balloons, Bill especially. A memory of happier times.

  By Thanksgiving, the work on the house was done. That morning, I walked around making sure everything was perfect before our friends and family descended for dinner. At one point, I stood on the front porch and saw some people gathered down at the corner of our street around a bunch of colorful homemade “Thank You” signs stuck in the ground. Kids from the neighborhood had made them for me for Thanksgiving, covered in hearts and rainbows and American flags. It was one of many kind gestures—not just from friends and loved ones but also from complete strangers—that made that first month more bearable.