Why D.C. Is My Happy Place

Last Sunday was the Equality March, where LGBTQ folks, allies, and Women’s March stalwarts gathered to show our pride and solidarity and to protest the Trump regime. As my BFF/ex-wife and I walked into the crowd at Farragut Square, we happened upon a wave of woohoos. A marching band in matching purple T-shirts played “We’re Not Gonna Take It” and I felt old when only a few people looked fired up about that. When they played “Born This Way,” I jumped around in sincere joy at my people’s unofficial anthem.

It was certainly the biggest LGBTQ demonstration I’ve ever been in, though of course it was teensy compared to the D.C. Women’s March. Amy was carrying a pinwheel she’d made herself!

 and I’d painted a sign that said this:

Since November, protests have come to feel like a second home to me. I take so much comfort in the signs, both the clever puns and the classics:

I’ve been chanting “This is what democracy looks like!” for twenty years, and I was amused by the addition of “Racist, sexist, anti-gay, Donald Trump, sashay away!” The crowd grew at every intersection, and was ebullient until we reached the White House—you could hear the boos and the “Shame, shame, shame!” chants from many blocks away. When we got there, we noticed snipers on the roof, but maybe they are always there. Though we were literally targets of the Trump administration, I felt completely safe. I know that’s partly a function of privilege, (It’s much safer for me in protests than it is for people of color, Muslim folks, and trans folks, a fact I try not to take for granted.) but being with The People tends to make me feel at home, whether I’m canvassing, marching, or just going in for my weekly therapy appointments at Women Organized Against Rape. Connection is what keeps me strong and happy, the opposite of helpless, knowing that we are many and we will not be silenced.

            After the march, Amy and I sat down in the shade outside the Museum of Natural History to catch our breath and have a snack. I needed to go in to use the restroom, and as I got metal-detected and wanded to get into the museum, a thought occurred to me: Everything in the entire Smithsonian is mine. The Hope Diamond and all of her mineral friends, the Ruby slippers, the Washington Monument, every fountain and path and sunken sculpture garden, it’s mine. Ours. It belongs to everyone at every intersection.

This is not and has never been a country that belongs only to straight white men, and I’m glad that so many of us are working to turn away from that default and toward ourselves and those who need our support.

On the way home, Amy and I happened to pass the National Cathedral (Picturing Jed Bartlett there, crushing out a cigarette in the transept…)I wanted to gaze up at the architecture and see if I could get inside to look at the stained glass, which I hadn’t seen since a school trip when I was twelve. (The fact that I ran out of film on that trip still haunts me. Thank goodness that’s not a concern anymore!) Amy, legs sore from marching, kindly waited outside in the turnaround while I went to explore.

The outside of the building was as awe-inspiring as I’d expected, but it was the windows that really transported me, brighter to my eyes because of all the rainbows I’d just spent the day with. Pictures don’t do justice to the saturated colors, which looked like the other-worldly light that I picture when I do chakra meditations. A choir was singing, and as I walked around lit up and mesmerized, I realized that I must look odd walking around a cathedral with my rainbow-ribbon pigtails, pride fest beads, spiked collar, and beribboned leather cuff, but I thought of course I’m in a cathedral all prided up, this is my cathedral too. Doubly so.

My Catholic ancestry and upbringing means that I share responsibility for the horrors of our past, but it’s never occurred to me that I could take ownership of the beauty too. Every rich, shining pane of glass, every flying buttress, belongs just as much to my queer, pro-choice voice-having lady self as it belongs to the pope himself. Maybe I’ll go to the Vatican someday and check out my Sistine Chapel, my Rafaels, my golden dome. As much as the horror is mine to inherit and try to correct, so is the light.

And the same goes for America. I’m used to taking part of the responsibility for the Native American genocide, for slavery, for the School to Prison Pipeline, sharing in those problems and knowing they are mine to help fix, but I’m also ready to claim the good things. I visit the Hope Diamond as often as I can because it’s beautiful and ours, just like President Obama’s legacy is beautiful and ours. We can hold hope in our hand and let it sparkle, never let anyone take it away.

The Day I Met Hillary Clinton

I’m pretty sure it was a thank-you note that did it. After our last round of canvassing the Saturday before the Pennsylvania primary, I had a melancholy end-of-camp feeling knowing that I might never see some of those amazing campaign ladies (and guys) again, so I sent a thank-you note over to my volunteer coordinator thanking her for the experience and letting her know I’d never felt this empowered to participate before. When she texted to thank me back, she asked for my information so that the Secret Service could screen me for Secretary Clinton’s photo line the next night at City Hall.

It was a surreal feeling to be watching Friends and playing weekend Candy Crush while being checked by the Secret Service. That’s April 2016 was, a quick swirl of the everyday and the profound, one minute shaking hands with a former U. S. President or the President of Planned Parenthood and the next being back to my flower pictures. I’d already pushed myself to the edges of my limited extroversion and was longing to be back to my comforting routine, but there was no way that I could pass up this chance.

When I got the text that I’d been approved, I asked if I was still needed for my volunteer duties, but the coordinator said “No need, just get your picture and have fun.” An email came with instructions for the VIP entrance and I switched around my tutoring schedule so I could go. I was NERVOUS the next day, so until it was time to (way too early) leave for the train I took the edge off by applying to summer jobs and cleaning out the downstairs closet.

Since the last time I took the train, Philly graffiti artists seem to have had an explosion, and I was blown away by the work I saw the whole way down. I vowed to stop being car girl all the time and take the train more, there’s just no excuse to miss that much art. As I crossed in front of City Hall, I remembered playing Scrabble on the steps on a day visit to the Occupy camp. I got to the entrance before some of the local police even knew what to expect, and I felt mortified to refer to myself as a VIP, which doesn’t feel very democratic. The entrance was where Market Street runs into City Hall, so the traffic and the tension of the moment were overstimulating. I practiced my deep breathing and ate a foil-wrapped sandwich for early supper, knowing food wouldn’t be allowed in the event.

Soon I was joined by a fellow early-bird, a nice lesbian of about my age or a little older, whom I recognized as one of Amy’s fellow data-entry volunteers. We bonded over our love of earliness and chatted about our pets and lives. She’d retired early from public service, listing disrespect from male supervisors as one of the reasons. “I can’t wait ‘til it’s thirty years from now,” she said, in terms of gender progress.  Next we were joined by a handsome young Iranian man who told us he’d been canvassing around Temple University, to little success. He expressed amazement that he’d seen young people at last week’s Hillary event, since we were by now conditioned not to expect them.

The VIP table was set up and when they found my name, I couldn’t help exclaiming “It’s real!” As the put on my bright green bracelet, I marveled aloud that this was probably the only time I would ever be considered a VIP, and I guess that sounded sad because a tall friendly guy in a “YAAAAAS” shirt said “Aw.”

We were led into a nice quiet room that looked like it might usually be used for jury selection—semi-comfortable chairs, small libraries of paperbacks, a water cooler that would definitely help me with my not-fainting goal.

The handsome college guy settled in to study for his finals and I chithatted with a striking woman in a grey suit who had a gorgeous tree of life tattoo on her leg, echoing the cherry blossoms out on the courtyard. This was not her first time in a VIP section. She’d been a super-volunteer on President Obama’s campaign and she said after she’d met him, meeting Beyoncé and Jay-Z seemed like no big deal. She told me about an all-nighter that she and her fellow volunteers had pulled setting up a rally on Broad Street, a night during which she’d had to decide between an hour of sleep or a shower before the event. It occurs to me now that I should have thanked her for healthcare and marriage equality.

A purple-shirted group of SIEU members for New York City joined us. A shy man with a West Indies accent showed me his Hillary selfies from an event a few nights before on his cracked-screen phone. Everyone was worried about their batteries and I wished I’d brought a charged to lend.

When it came time to line up for the photos, getting there early had no effect at all on our place in line. There were hundreds of people with us by then and I wondered how in the world every person would get a picture, but we were assured curtly by staffers that we all would. I told my early-bird pal it was her job to make sure I didn’t faint, and I assured her I was doing my deep breathing. When Madam Secretary entered the room in her perfect blue jacket, I fully squealed, and was not the only one.

In an odd coincidence, the president of the teachers’ union was a few people ahead of me in line, accompanied by my own former union rep whose inability to see me as a person convinced me that I was the only one who could protect myself from the corrupt and scary schools. It was a harsh but satisfying moment when the union rep looked back as if she couldn’t quite place me and I met her gaze with an unbreakable glare. Who knows if she remembered me, but I’d survived.  This year of healing work and this campaign had given me a new sense of what a woman is, of who I can be, of just how much power I really have as long as I have the courage to take it.

When I was ten people away from Hillary, staffers took my bag. When I was three people away, a man in a suit said “Take three steps forward, please.” And then, I was with Hillary, shaking her hand and saying “Thank you so much for all you’ve done” with all my heart and soul and guts. I looked into her eyes and saw the same exhaustion I’d seen in Bill’s a few weeks earlier. How is she doing this? How is she getting through?” “We’re gonna do this together,” she said for probably the thousandth time that day, but it still meant something. She expertly moved me into the picture, I smiled with my face next to hers and it was taken. I thanked her again, picked up my bag, and walked out into the breezy passageway, stunned.

Someone guided me to the volunteer section on the bleachers, and a fellow volunteer gave me his mini American flag. I stuck it in my hair like I’d done with my rainbow flag on the first Equality Day. This has been both my loneliest and my least-lonely year.

A few weeks before, some of my friends had felt intimidated into not posting pro-Hillary statuses (and not for nothing, as I’ve lost or unfriended about 80 acquaintances in the past month) but here was real life again, being so safe and all-kinds-of-integrated and hopeful. The person who introduced the mayor and Secretary Clinton was head of a local GLBT organization and would not have looked out of place in a Tegan and Sara video. This was a different kind of Equality Day. This was a happy and peaceful crowd cheering for equal pay and reproductive rights and, as the City Hall bells coincidently but solemnly chimed, for gun control. Away from the sarcastic remove of the internet, here was a place where it was free to be hopeful and positive and progressive and sincere.

It’s a long time ‘til November and I know there are so many people who stopped listening to me a long time ago, but if I could convince one more person of one more thing, it’s this: You’re needed. You’re wanted. Though loud, bullying voices may convince you that you don’t have a right to participate, you do. As we move toward the general election, thoughtful people will have the chance to stand on the side of good and protect those who need it most. If you’re reading this, you’re probably coming from some place of privilege, and this is a good time to use that privilege to stand up for the people who would be hurt most by a Trump presidency. Plus, it’s really fun.

Canvassing for Happiness

So it turns out that the world is a lot like it looks to my panic attacks. Everyone is jangled as the reality of Trump voters settles in. A small faction of Sanders supporters have decided it’s okay to throw dollar bills at the former Secretary of State and call her a whore. Campaign emails designed to fire us up to fight for good can bring out the worst in everyone, including me. Even my incredibly well-curated facebook feed can trick me into thinking I’m on a battleground. My heart has started doing this new beating-really-fast thing to signal when I’ve had enough.

But the part that seemed like it would be the hardest, the actual calling of strangers and knocking on doors, turns out to be the part that makes my heart feel most at ease. As soon as I get a phone list or a canvassing map in my hand, I feel like a new person, confident and purposeful. I’m still shy, and I still have to keep back tears on some topics, but I feel a sense of safety, a flow like I’m on the right track.

Before President Obama’s first campaign, it never would have occurred to me that I could do more for the process than vote. I don’t know how he convinced me that I was entitled to participate in his campaign, but he did, and I’ll never stop being grateful. Phone banking that fall was an easy job. Almost every call was a lovefest, and those phonebanks are some of my warmest memories, despite the raging toothache I had the whole time.

This time around, I thought the calling might be tougher. Before I managed to reweight its algorithm, my facebook feed could sometimes convince me that I and a handful of my pals were alone in a sea of Sanders-love. But the thing about real life is, it’s a safer place. Many people were happy and relieved to hear from us and almost all of those who were opposed were still kind and respectful.

Last weekend was my first time knocking on doors for a candidate, and it was the most perfect paradigm of a spring evening, complete with exuberant tulips and smell-of-happiness lilacs. A woman stopped us in the street and said “Oh! God bless you!” and signed up to volunteer on the spot. A couple of ladies wearing rainbow H buttons gave us an enthusiastic “Go Hillary!” (This happens to me daily even when I’m not canvassing, and it rules.) Neighbors of all categories said “yes” or “no” or “uncommitted” and I couldn’t help but geek out to myself (and also geek out to Amy) that! Democracy is amazing! And! These are our neighbors! And we’re not helpless! We can do something! I get extremely corny around election time and I’m totally not sorry.

The next day, when I went back to photograph all the flowers I’d longed after while canvassing, I felt even more at home here than I usually do. No matter the election’s outcome, having heard so many voices and looked into so many faces will make me a healthier and happier human being.

Since I left my church last year, I’ve had (with a few wonderful exceptions) trouble sustaining close friendships. The heart-space that had formerly been occupied with close chats and post-church brunches has often been filled by the little daily moments with strangers that give me a sense of hope and belonging. This election has made me rich with those moments. This year and beyond, I hope I have the strength to stop scrolling myself into Internet Brain Poisoning and keep finding joy in real life.

We Have Been Known to Rally

In a rally to support the Democratic candidates in the upcoming midterm election, yesterday The Roots opened for the President and Vice President right behind our house, in the playground of the school where I worked when we first moved to Philly. I’m not quite over the shock, still, of living someplace where such a thing could happen.

I’d originally planned to go to church and then join Amy in line, but I got antsy when I started seeing families getting in line with families of folding chairs already at 10:30 am (doors were at 3), so I went home and tried to get cute while Amy made us some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Yesterday was the most out that Amy and I have ever been here in our superchurchy neighborhood. Going to line up for a Democratic rally, it seemed more okay to hold hands than it usually does. We were also happy to sort of snuggle up in a sleepy way in the sun during the four hour wait.

The wait wasn’t too bad. We both brought reading material and were entertained by a the very excited group in front of us first naming TV shows and then having an awesome, awesome sing along.

Of course we signed up, in a wave of 2008 hopeandchange nostalgia, for some campaign work this month. (Politics, like baseball, are something I tend to mostly only notice in October…)

I liked how, when we got to the gate, the security guard was splitting people up by “families” to go in, whether they were actually families or not.

We found a spot about 30 feet from the stage where we could clearly see both the podium and The Roots’s instruments. After a few minutes, who should come over and stand in front of us but one Mr. Mark A, my favorite student from when I worked at Fulton. He was with two young family members who I think may’ve been dressed in purple for tolerance.

Ending up behind them, out of all the 18,000 people, made me feel like the Universe was telling me I’m forgiven for the past two years’ teaching mistakes, and am now free and clear to make some more. 

After this amazing kid’s rendition of The Star Spangled banner, a DJ who played such crowd pleasers as “It Takes Two” and “Poison” (Not to mention line dances we gamely tried to execute, despite the smooshed lack of space), here came The Roots.

They were amazing, of course, though I wish the crowd had been a little more willing to go bonkers with them.(Gratuitous aside: I never realized how hot The Roots are. Usually my Sunday forays into my hetero side begin and end with Mad Men…) Amy and I had debated whether “Dear God” was a politic song for them to sing…Amy won, I guess, cause they sang it. I was happy to sing “Why do haters separate us like we Siamese?” and the original Monsters of Folk lyrics: “I know I’m thinkin’ aloud, /But if your love’s still around/Why do we suffer?” along with 18,000 people. Pretty much makes up for missing church.

After The Roots and the actual 2010 candidates, Joe Biden introduced the President. They hugged for such a long time before the president began speaking.

The last time we saw Barack Obama speak, it was also right by my house—in Vernon Park on October 11, 2008, a few weeks before he won the election. It was a beautiful day then, too, and they kept playing that U2 “Beautiful Day” song that I begrudgingly ended up liking because it reminds me of campaign fun. I was in the middle of a race and class-struggle awakening and I really felt all the hopeandchange. I was pretty much drunk on it. We still have the flyer from that day along with other campaign ephemera on the wall.

Since that day, I’ve gotten more reticent and measured about working for change, and the nation and the president have been through a whole lot of shit. His voice has a nice pissed-off edge. He called out the Republicans on their nay-saying, rich people funding, education fucking-over: it was the most calling out that I have ever heard a democrat do.

If that speech that moved me so much in Vernon Park was the Meet the Beatles with all that exuberance, newness, and revelation, then the speech I heard yesterday is somewhere between Revolver and Abbey Road—edged, complex, and a little heartbroken. I loved it.

I didn’t love his getting-the-car-out-of-a-ditch metaphor, though. It reminded me of this household’s hopeless car years. Can’t argue with his “You put a car in “D” to move forward, in “R” to go backward” joke, though.

I can’t say that I fully believe in elections anymore. Ever since I found out that some of my students saw 2008 as a black versus white election, I’ve felt like things are so many years away from true justice and peace. But I do look forward to working on the Democrats' campaign this month. It just comes down to; it’s more fun than helplessness.

You can commit to vote and find volunteer opportunities here: http://www.barackobama.com/