On Saturday I went and had coffee with R. down the street, as I was going to stay at her place that night and keep an eye on her cats (one of whom only has three legs, I might add). It was a quick but good visit. While I had been a friend of her brother's growing up, I have seen more of R. in the last three years and have enjoyed getting to know her a bit more and enjoying her lovely deck and hospitality. Anyways. I drove to the Forest Glen Metro stop a good hour or so before the rally was to begin, thinking that would lessen the crowds at such a remote outpost (third from the end of the line). I was mistaken. I spent 20 minutes just standing in line to get a metro card and the train I got on was already packed when I added my weight and breath to the mix. While I was surprised by the crowds at this time and location, I understood that this was how it was going to be at the rally...but one woman with three children under 10 seemed surprised by this fact. I worried for the children's safety and the woman's sanity...does that count as ironic, since she was going to a rally for sanity?
And this is what it looked like once I got off the train.
Madness.
I ended up around 7th and Madison, so far from anything that I had no idea which direction I even wanted to go in for a while. There were plenty of eccentrics and a smattering of assholes in the heaving, shoving mass of people I struggled through for an hour before giving up. C. and I had planned on meeting up but cell phone service ceased functioning, so there was no way to know where she was and I was so far away from the stage and soundsystem that it was just a test of whether I was going to have a panic attack or not. Sanity. I think not. Once I got out of the swarm and walked a block or two, cell service returned and I received C.'s text saying that she and her group had also decided that the frustrations of the crowds weren't worth the trouble. They had gone on to a bar to watch the event on television, so I met up with them and watched the majority of the show from a bar near Union Station, the name of which I forget, but I think they liked some mid-western college football team or something.
I went because I thought it would be funny. I went because I thought the overall reason to go (to be counted as someone who was tired of all the polarized everything in this country) was one I could get behind. I went. It was a disappointment. And while I am emotionally intelligent and won't go crazy over this, I can't help but think that I shouldn't have gone. Instead of returning to TN after the event I went up to Philly to work for the week, and by week's end my mother had died. Had I really thought this was likely to happen during my absence, I wouldn't have gone...but to say that I didn't see the writing on the wall would be false. So. Yeah. I went to a rally for sanity while my mother was living out her last week, and the rally wasn't even that much fun. I blame Stephen Colbert. Not really.
And this is what it looked like once I got off the train.
Madness.
I ended up around 7th and Madison, so far from anything that I had no idea which direction I even wanted to go in for a while. There were plenty of eccentrics and a smattering of assholes in the heaving, shoving mass of people I struggled through for an hour before giving up. C. and I had planned on meeting up but cell phone service ceased functioning, so there was no way to know where she was and I was so far away from the stage and soundsystem that it was just a test of whether I was going to have a panic attack or not. Sanity. I think not. Once I got out of the swarm and walked a block or two, cell service returned and I received C.'s text saying that she and her group had also decided that the frustrations of the crowds weren't worth the trouble. They had gone on to a bar to watch the event on television, so I met up with them and watched the majority of the show from a bar near Union Station, the name of which I forget, but I think they liked some mid-western college football team or something.
I went because I thought it would be funny. I went because I thought the overall reason to go (to be counted as someone who was tired of all the polarized everything in this country) was one I could get behind. I went. It was a disappointment. And while I am emotionally intelligent and won't go crazy over this, I can't help but think that I shouldn't have gone. Instead of returning to TN after the event I went up to Philly to work for the week, and by week's end my mother had died. Had I really thought this was likely to happen during my absence, I wouldn't have gone...but to say that I didn't see the writing on the wall would be false. So. Yeah. I went to a rally for sanity while my mother was living out her last week, and the rally wasn't even that much fun. I blame Stephen Colbert. Not really.
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