#SwarmTheCapitol :: what a day

A non-political and also comedic post is coming tomorrow, but for now, sit with me in the shaky, dispirited place I’ve been since K and I left the Capitol around 2.

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K, aka Thursday walking friend, and I signed on for today’s day of action as soon as we heard about it late last week. It was a Herculean organizing effort in just a few days with people from all over coming in to make our voices heard, and she and I wanted to add ours. My longtime resister pal, Julie, signed on too, as did another friend, Marne. K and I met up at 9:30a and headed to an Episcopal church in Northeast DC for the pre-protest training.

There were tons of people of all stripes there, the organizers and musicians were inspiring, tables were laden with shirts, pins, stickers and more, all of which everyone was welcome to, for a donation or not, the spirit of inclusion and purpose was pervasive. We sat on the floor behind an older man with hearing aids, an elderly woman with stickers on her cheeks, and an inspired woman wearing so much flair that the manager of Chotchkie's would have hired and promoted her on the spot. We papered ourselves with stickers. Reverend Barber and the Poor People’s Campaign prepared in the room next to ours.

I completed a form that would allow the organizers to track and support me were I arrested, and K agreed to be my contact and pick the boys up if need be. Marne found and plopped on the floor next to us. She has a tiny baby at home and came out for a few hours to do what we should all be doing. It was really good to see her. The organizers introduced the marshal's and outlined the plan of action: we’d go to the Hart Senate Building atrium for a silent protest and then head to the steps of the Capitol. Julie said she’d meet us at Hart.

Around 11:30, we headed out of the beautiful church. We were many. We chanted, hugged, smiled, power-fisted. We didn’t verbalize it openly, but we all felt a sense of hope and determination: how can people who say they want a fair trial NOT want to hear from witnesses? Witnesses and documentary evidence. Aren’t we told, as citizens when we sit on jury duty, to impartially listen to both sides, taking into account all witnesses and evidence? Of course we are. So why shouldn’t Congress?

Our path took us past the Supreme Court: Justice the Guardian of Liberty. We waited patiently in the security line at Hart. We quietly applauded the number of civil disobedients there. We took stock of the number of police folks, both Capitol and DCPD. We know the rules. We respect them.

we never could figure out why we were smiling. conditioning? enjoyable to do something so meaningful together?

we never could figure out why we were smiling. conditioning? enjoyable to do something so meaningful together?

And yet the increasing numbers of enforcement officers felt intentionally threatening. The Silent Swarm, everyone meandering around the atrium like silent dust motes on various currents, is the way you can “protest” in the Senate. And so we did. The police presence grew, Julie waited nearly 20 minutes to get through security, and finally we were told that once we passed the seemingly arbitrary police line, we couldn’t go back. To the Capitol we went.

It was a glorious day here. Blue skies, dramatic clouds. It was cold. A pro-democracy org handed out hats; K and I each took one and were grateful. Marne left, Julie walked with us, we saw another resister friend along the way. We met a woman using a walker who’d taken a 1am flight into DC. Young people with bullhorns, older people with canes. Moms with strollers, people who looked rigid with anger and heartbreak. I felt bits of all of them. I tucked a snack bag of almonds into Julie’s pocket and gave the woman with a walker a small packet of Kleenex.

As we walked up to the Capitol, straight on, I felt I was approaching the reaping in The Hunger Games: determined, worried, enraged citizens maintaining equilibrium and decorum while marching up to a giant white marble edifice guarded by vested, armed officers who seemed pissed before we arrived. We lowered our signs, our voices, our fists. We have the right to assemble and the right to express ourselves. But past a certain line, on federal property that we pay for and to which we send elected officials, our rights become fuzzy, obscured in a vortex of permitting, mood, private and public space, and the people behind the window treatments.

It’s not a good feeling. That feeling didn’t improve as we were pushed off of and back from the stairs and then back, back, back towards the Supreme Court by a thick line of police. It didn’t improve as those who remained on the Capitol stairs were arrested one-by-one and handcuffed with zip ties. It didn’t improve as the final protester, a person in a wheelchair, was pushed away toward the paddy wagon (even though we cheered wildly for their courage). It didn’t improve as we checked in on Twitter to hear of the bullshit arguments against every law-breaking activity perpetrated by trump being made by his shill cavalry of sell-out “lawyers.” Does no one care about oath? Rules? Right?

just before the arrest

just before the arrest

that’s me, fist raised

that’s me, fist raised

It never improved. Is it democracy when a peaceful protester’s Demand Democracy sign is ripped from his hands as he’s walked away and arrested? As another protester is dragged down the stairs, mouth covered?

This evening, I held my boys tight, helped with homework, played with the cats, served dinner. Keep calling, acting, defending, fighting. She’s worth it.

March For Our Lives

I don't even know where the twelve days since I returned from Louisiana have gone but they've involved moving out of our house for a week so that our floors could be refinished, a school day, some delays, Tom being out of town for three days, Oliver's birthday and parties, moving back into our house, the kitchen being largely completed, my parents coming, and, today, participating in the huge and extraordinarily moving March For Our Lives here in DC. So please, apologies for any lack of coherence and polish in this post.

Last night, as Mom, a dear family friend from Louisiana, and I made our protest signs, Oliver eagerly joined us to help with coloring and duct tape application. Earnestly, and almost as an aside, he said, "I don't want to die." Our hearts just broke. THIS is why we marched today, because too many children die or fear dying by guns. Too many people do. Every day. Gun violence is a public health crisis, a detestable scourge in this country. We can do something, and that something is NOT arming teachers.

Mom, Dad, Susan, and I started today by attending a pre-March rally in Silver Spring hosted by Jamie Raskin, state senator from Maryland's 8th. Rep Raskin is such a fine leader, one of the many reasons I'm proud to call MD home. At the rally, we heard and were fired up by the Reverend William Barber (amazing orator and person; listen to his speech to us here), MD's wonderful Attorney General, Brian Frosh, former MD governor, Martin O'Malley, some student leaders from Montgomery County (MoCo) Students for Gun Control, and Mr. Raskin himself. It should be noted that Maryland has enacted some of the strictest gun control measures in the country!

Barber speaking against the theological malpractice of those "who say so much about what God says so little, and so little about what God says so much."

Barber speaking against the theological malpractice of those "who say so much about what God says so little, and so little about what God says so much."

We then boarded buses to Union Station and from there walked toward the chants and cheers of an ever-growing crowd blanketing Pennsylvania and Constitution Avenues from 3rd to 12th Streets (with much spilling over). 

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I think each of us felt repeated waves of emotion wash over us for hours on end. Listening to young leaders like Edna Chavez, Emma Gonzalez, eleven-year-old Naomi Wadler, Matt Post (a MoCo Students for Gun Control leader), and so many inspiring others was profound. I urge you to click on each of their names and watch or read the clips I've shared. 

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We appreciated others' signs, we marveled at the number of attendees (some estimates put the DC march at 800,000), and I considered how this March felt similar to and different from all the others I've attended. Most essentially, we hoped that today and what today represents marks the start of real change for a safer, saner tomorrow. 

Preach!

Preach!

Check out this compilation of photos from marches around the country and world! I'm so grateful for the students leading this charge and for all who marched today.

photo by my friend, Dorothy

photo by my friend, Dorothy

Oh no he didn't! Trump, Comey, et al

Except he did. The Evil Yam is mad and pouting and stamping his feet that we, the lowly citizens on whose behalf HE (is supposed to) WORKS, won't let things go.

We continue to push for investigations into Russia's interference with the 2016 presidential election.
We demand an understanding of Trump's relationship with Putin.
We insist on understanding why the FBI Director was suddenly ousted just days after requesting more funding to expand the Russia probe, and on the suggestion of Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, was previously recused himself from this entire investigation.
We refuse to stop until an independent counsel is appointed to continue this investigation. We will not wait until next year. We want and deserve the truth. Now.
We refuse to acknowledge Sarah Huckabee Sanders' pathetic claim that Comey committed atrocities and that America needs to "put this Russia stuff behind us."
We refuse to accept that while hundreds of us protest in front of the White House, the people's house, Trump meets privately with Russian foreign minister, Lavrov, and Ambassador Kislyak (yeah, the one who met with Flynn so often), and allows not the US media but the Russian media inside. Yeah, that happened today.

Mom, who is here for both boys' Grandparents' Days, and I were so pissed after last night's sudden firing of Comey (of whom neither of us are even fans, but come on!) that we decided to head downtown for today's "Comey Fired protest" quickly organized by MoveOn and many others. 

Y'all know that I have, since the Women's March, been to not a few protests, marches, and rallies. I have a library of signs -worn to various degrees by weather and crowd size- in my office, a growing selection of Resistance shirts in my drawer, and my Resistance backpack always at the ready. Most events I've attended have been determined and upbeat; despite the odds, we will persevere. That sort of thing.

The rally in Dupont Circle following Trump's first attempted Muslin Ban was a gathering of fury. We were there, and spirited, but an undercurrent of what-the-fuckness coursed through the crowd.

Today was an energetic gathering of several hundred, but it distinguished itself from the others I've attended with a decidedly depressed air. It did not lack in spirit. Anger. Resistance. Determination.

But the dark cloud of autocracy hung over us, the horrid juxtaposition of the gleaming White House dressed up with bright red flowers and a stunning blue sky with the craven inhabitants clobbering our national integrity and democracy behind curtained windows blocking all possible light. 

Mom was alternately furious and in tears.

"I fought so hard for so much of this decades ago. Why is he taking us back? Back, back, back?"

It was sad and enraging, and my primary reaction was to raise my fist, yell "SHAME!" and determine to keep fighting, keep resisting, do everything I can to preserve the democracy Americans are lucky to enjoy, even when they seem so terribly ignorant of all it offers and promises. It is not perfect, but the places Trump and his soulless, morally bankrupt cronies want to take us? That is an evil darkness like the stifling underdeck of a slave ship. Like a desperate, bleeding woman in a back alley. 

We cannot afford to go there. And so we fight.

"These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph."
-Thomas Paine