Break

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/chicago/family-blames-bullying-10-old-girl-suicide-115722068.html

Every time my heart shatters, I pick it up again and put it back together. Not well, and pieces are generally missing, but I do it and I do it by myself because no one else will. No one else can.

That’s what being bullied taught me.

The people who would try to help—the one girl who ran after me, brought me back to Boalsburg-Panorama Elementary School sobbing and hysterical, after I had walked right out of it and was heading towards the highway, the only way I knew to get home… she would get in trouble for “leaving school grounds”.

The guidance counselor who sat in her quiet room and gave me Play-doh would suggest I stop crying so very much.

And the teachers who ignored my sobbing in the playground and the hallway would keep ignoring the sobbing wherever it came from.

I am not stronger than that girl from Illinois. I was two years older, though. It didn't occur to me to ask permission from anyone: I left school—I trembled, but I could not stay in that place a moment longer—I fled.

And I wasn’t planning on committing suicide, but walking home along a busy road with no sidewalks in a semi-rural area isn’t exactly the safest choice. I knew it was dangerous. Especially since, having moved houses and schools just a month or two ago, I wasn’t exactly sure I knew the way home. (I moved a lot as a kid, living in 13 houses by the time I was 13—though I think that number included the couches we surfed while we were homeless.)

Anyway, I knew there were lots of horrible places to be. But in that eternal spring of bullying and tears of pain and rage and the endless stream of powerless adults inflicted on me, anywhere else was better. 

So my heart breaks for that girl in Illinois, because I know what it feels like to need escape that badly. Sometimes, it feels like the only happy ending is an ending.

…But I can’t end this story there, because my story didn’t end there…

I did have one almost-stranger who cared.  What tugged me back up the long hill to school was one child—one person in that dark rabbit warren of a school, who gave a fuck. 

She didn’t—couldn’t—stop the bullying.

That’s the thing I learned about bullies, no one can change them but themselves.

But I learned I could endure until I had a chance to run away. And I did escape—junior high was a nightmare for many people, but for me it was heaven because everyone started off new and lonely and terrified. That was my native state, and I mostly excelled in it.

Later, as an adult, when I was so trapped I called a suicide prevention hotline—someone answered the phone. One person reassured me that I was allowed to escape, that leaving was a good idea, and I did.

I went to England, and when people asked me why, I said, “I want to see what happens next.” … I wasn’t running away from my expensive degree or the terrible domestic situation I was in, oh no, I was a hero on a quest. And I found so much joy in that search:  a new home, a new life, and a new love that has become my happily ever after.

I want to tell people… oh, all sorts of things. Be kind, be helpful, be whatever.

But when someone is in pain, telling them to stand up and take it is not, actually, helpful.

If there is a reason—space, time, they are such frustrating constraints—that you can’t stand up with the bullied person and her pain, then if you want to help—help her escape.

Tell her she is strong.

Tell her leaving isn’t cowardice.

Tell her she isn’t alone, and then prove it.

Pain can teach you all sorts of things. If you have a reason to resist, a hope to hold onto, it can teach you to endure and withstand so that you can be the hero in someone else’s story. It can teach you that other people have stories, and you can learn something from listening to the wise old crone with a pair of magic running shoes.

But if you are at the breaking point, you have nothing left to hold yourself together with… There is nothing else within you left to endure. There is no strength and there is no power within you to call on or to protect.

So I tell you: when someone tells you they are breaking, help them break-- away.

*

Now, how do I justify this post on my Occupied Life blog? 

I keep thinking about http://occupywallstreetstories.com/occupy-has-saved-my-life.html

And I keep thinking how nobody grabbed Calvin H (or one of my other less violent but no less consistent tormenters) and said, “Dude, what is the matter with *you*? Why are you hitting her so very much? How can you ignore your own conscience?”

I had that one person. She was my sign that not everyone on that playground agreed with or tacitly supported the bullies’ right to bully. One person supported my right to not get hit. She gave me the strength to walk back into the short sharp shit-storm I left behind and endure a little longer.

I think society has created these entertainment complexes and cultural trappings so that we don’t have to stand up to the bullies and the sick systems that perpetuate them. It’s easier to escape together than stand up together.

Occupy is my one person, right now-- my one glorious sign that not everyone supports my government's right to bully everyone who isn't a generous campaign donor.

More than that, though, I think (I hope) that Occupy and the basic practices it is trying to foster are not just about enduring in a space, though that is a powerful statement. Ultimately, it is modeling how to stand up to the bullies—through humor and non violence and most of all, together.

So I tell you, person who is at the breaking point, country that is crying in pain and rage:

We are strong.

We are brave.

We are not—and never have been—alone.

Now… let’s see what happens next!

Seth and Marsha and Rivka, too

I am so tired.

I didn’t make my regular food delivery Saturday morning; I was just too tired to do enough dishes I could cook enough to make it worth the cab fare. Plus, my usual crew of helpful scrubbers was unable to come by Friday night, and I couldn’t face 20 pounds of potatoes all by myself.

Slowly Saturday I did one thing and then another, though, and by noon Sunday I had 2 gallons of apple sauce and two boxes of salad fixings and 2.5 gallons of vegetable risotto.

Not before losing my temper (Occupy Hormones), though, and feeling like a heel as I swooped out the door. Have I mentioned lately how I’m human and shit? Yeah. Human. Me.

(shocking, I know…)

Anyway, the cab driver was nice but we had a miscommunication so we managed to go the wrong way for ten extra minutes, and I was just relieved when I finally saw familiar shops. He was willing to pull into the side street though, and helped me unload, so I tipped very well… but I was a little stressed since he made sure to communicate that I had told him to take the wrong turn.

Alll Myyy Faaaauuuult.

Got everything piled up on my handcart, but I hit a pothole and the light was about to change and there was a parent with a stroller trying to make it across so I was a little distracted at the sidewalk ramp—and I ploughed into a cop.

I apologized. She yelled. She yelled a lot. I tried to explain it was an accident and I apologized but she was not interested in hearing my apology. It was so strange—I teach my kids to say I’m sorry and to make it better if they can, whether that’s by kissing or trying to do better the next time. But there was no way to make this better. The cop was angry. At me. I’m really not used to that, you know? I’m little and cute and avoid authority figures whenever possible…

And so I escaped and sniffled my way through almost to the kitchen, and when I was at the last narrow alleyway two guys were lugging a huge open tub filled with dirty water and I had to back up over ground I had worked so hard to cover, and in so doing I stepped onto a tent and…

I broke down. I lost a few seconds.

Then there was Seth, asking if he could give me a hug and a nameless young man who made my cart disappear to the kitchen and stayed with it until I made my graceless and bleary way to it. And Seth took me to Comfort (which now has its own military style tent) so I could unload my huge backpack and put away the hand cart which is a menace but indispensable when I insist on cooking more than I can carry.

And then I talked to Marsha, the first and most- photographed knitting grandma. We agreed that Occupy Hormones was a valid issue and maybe we could bring it to one of the working groups. She made me laugh, and said that it does get easier to let things go once you get through menopause. I am suddenly looking much more forward to the end of all bloodshed.

Then Rivka came up, asking if she could barter with Marsha for a hand-knit thing, as her mother made her something every winter but she died a year ago this coming Wednesday. She said she and her brothers had just been saying, “But who will knit for us?” and she started to wobble a little bit, and I asked if I could give her a hug and she wobbled into my shoulder.

I am still tired. My house is a mess, there is a scandalously large pile of dirty dishes next to the sink… and on the counter… and… yeah. Lots. Just everywhere.

Occupy Wall Street is full of stressed out people—but so is everywhere.

We’re all tired, I think, of DIY.

Here’s to togetherness.

Personally

I take everything personally. Let’s start with that.

I have nothing more to say about McQueary or Paterno as individuals that I didn’t say in my Heroes post.

I want to speak to the outrage that people are hurling around. I want to say to that monstrous outrage—Good!

Be outraged.

Sit with your horror and your outrage, and promise everyone that you would do differently, if it had been you.

Sit with that theoretical you until you know every scratch and pimple and throbbing vein on it. See how strong and powerful that hypothetical you is.

And now, step up. Step into that you.

Because it is you.

You will not rest. You will not take the easier, more comfortable decision. You will not rely on your father or your mother or your boss or your lawyer or your politician.

You will stand up and be present. You will not run away, you will not be beaten down, you will not be frightened or subdued or conciliatory or rational or wrong.

You will be aware, and you will step up and you will speak out and you will comfort and—most of all—you will listen. You will believe. You will consider. You will act in the best interests of the weak and the ostracized and the power-less-than-yous.

Take your outrage and use it to power the construction of a world that is bigger than a coward’s heart or a locked room or an unhappy valley or a bruised institution.

Please, whatever you do, don’t use that outrage to distance yourself.

Don’t use it to reassure yourself how much better you are than any of the characters in this story, how you don’t need to consider your own (un)comfortable silences and (almost) good enoughs.

We are all persons, stuck with our humanity.

The problem with the inhumane among us is not just that they hurt and betray others. What makes their actions monstrous is they create situations where other humans are forced to choose between betrayal or betrayal, with no grace or glory in the terrible, hurtful consequences of either action.

And no one involved in that pain-choked choice comes away unscathed, or with all their humanity intact.

Don’t just choose to be strong. Choose to help the weak.

Choose to have eyes that see and ears that hear.

Choose to create choices for others that include love and support and community, so that eventually—some day, not in this crisis moment, but maybe it could be sooner rather than later—there can be something that feels like healing, even though the pain never completely goes away.

Personally, I would thank you for it.

Whee!

Well, I was just going to write up this morning’s quick trip to Occupy, but I see that my pageviews went from 301 (I’m pretty sure at least half of those were spam bots) to 800+… er, hi Whatevers! I love you! Um, hope you don’t mind if I go back to writing about Liberty Plaza/Square/Park thing here…I feel like I've just been slash-dotted... in a literary kind of way. Squee. I'll try not to let the attention go to my head.

(er, if you want to chip in with my efforts, http://alia.chipin.com/mypages/ is where I’m collecting for my OccupyCostco habit. And if you love my writing style and really want to see my novel that is currently languishing on Baen’s slush pile—it’s about a solar harvesting commune in the sky attacked by corporate raiders… Maybe I should rename it OccupySky?... you can read the first part of it here: http://alia-gee.com/default.aspx)

Regular Occupy Missive:

Dropped off 5 Ziploc bags of split pea and barley soup. Smuggled in some green vegetables in the form of cardones—an interesting culinary experiment, but I don’t feel moved to try it again. It was an awful lot of work to make it taste less bitter—and three dozen hardboiled eggs.

The kitchen volunteers have started wearing nametags. I suppose it is more pleasant than saying, “Hey, you, pass the bucket of compost.” I worry at every little change, practical or esoteric, but hopefully it will help with communication more than it will create an insider-outsider vibe. The people working seemed happy and busy but not overwhelmed, anyway, so that was good.

It was a flying visit, but I got to see two of the three big military tents I had heard about, and it looks like the library also has some sort of exciting structure, like a barrel cut in half that they have some books and some sleeping tents underneath. Forty per cent chance of rain today, so I’m glad the books and the people will be dry.

 And now I must pick up The Big Child from school… if you’re in the area and want to help, we’ll be doing our regular Friday Night Chopping Vegetables for the Revolution at my house tomorrow evening.

Heroes

I have a letter in a box somewhere from Joe Paterno. It is a very short letter, explaining that while he couldn’t judge a contest my fifth grade class was holding (despite the letter I wrote him in my very best handwriting. I even resorted to outlining some words in magic marker so he would understand how serious our plea was), we should keep rooting for Penn State.

Of course we would root for Penn State, whether he judged us or not. Joe wasn’t a hero to our rural Pennsylvania school; he was a god. For those holdouts who weren’t quite ready to make JoePa divine (How do you know God is a Penn State fan? The sky is blue and white!), he was the patron saint of the clean cut and the pure of heart. If you worked hard and honorably, you too could be admitted into his pantheon at Penn State. In fact, even if you had—like me and my family—only moved to the neighborhood a couple of weeks before school started, the price of admission was low—just come to the homecoming parade and shout, “We are… Penn State!” and a few flecks of his gold dust could land on you.

The all-encompassing nature of Penn State (drinking school with a football problem), was something every Happy Valley resident grappled with. Grange Fair babies in the spring, Nittany Lion traffic in the autumn. You might plan your day around the home games to avoid them or to join them, but you couldn’t ignore them.

In return, JoePa didn’t ignore my colorful letter. I never thought that Joe Paterno, or anyone who grew up to nestle under his tough and leathery wing, could ignore a child being raped in their sacred locker room.

*

As I’ve plunged into the Occupy Wall Street movement, I’ve become open to new realities where riots happen in California and it matters to me. And who gets arrested at my local occupation, through the wonders of the internet and solidarity, matters to people in Egypt and Poughkeepsie.

I admire people who risk their comfort and even their lives in front of riot squads for justice, for democracy, for freedom from fear. They make me tremble; I fear for them, who sacrifice their bodies so their fellow humans can be free. That is grace under fire, that is heroic… but that isn’t me. I can feed them and tweet about them but I cannot be them.

I was, however, Penn State.

Even though I had no special love for sports in general, I admired the things that Joe Pa stood for. If I couldn’t be a football player, I could still work hard and honorably, I could still cheer for the community he created in his image. I could still find pleasure in seeing Penn State sweatshirts and bumper stickers outside of Happy Valley, a spot of familiar blue and white wherever I went. The Penn State football franchise might not have been all that and a bag of chips in my book, but they were alright.

But as the allegations of child rape and systemic cover-ups seep into my consciousness, nothing feels alright. I am brought down to my knees, the ground underneath me shakes. Questioning neo-liberal capitalism is a cakewalk, intellectually, compared to trying to understand how anyone—even Mike McQueary, who enthusiastically shoved nerds into their junior high lockers, way in the way back—could sacrifice a child so Penn State could pretend nothing happened.

There is no honor in that.There is only shame.

When I got the chance to hug Hero Vincent, outside Rafi’s coffee cart in Liberty Plaza, I thanked him for putting himself on the line for my kids. I stuttered awkwardly, then added, “I mean, I know you’re not doing it *for them*…”

He gently interrupted me, “I’m doing it for everybody.”

That’s the thing about heroes—they don’t sacrifice children. They sacrifice themselves.

Now… I am still Penn State, moreso than I realized until this horrific story came out. I still hope that there will somewhere in the tale be a moment of grace, a heroic stand, a person determined and true.

As of now, though, the only comfort I have is remembering that I am not just a “Little Lion” staring up in awe at a parade float majestically passing by. I am also a member of the 99%, working determinedly for a more just society, where anyone can be a hero, but no other person is sacrificed.

May no act of mine bring shame.

Fearless

I am afraid of my shadow

                When it disappears into someone else’s darkness

                And leaves me alone

I am afraid of change

                When it doesn’t come with a power point presentation

                And familiar narrative framework

I am afraid of resistance

                When it doesn’t belong to anyone I know

                And doesn’t care

I am afraid of the police

                When I can’t tell what side of the broken law

                I am on

I am afraid you fearless marchers won’t have room for me in your revolution

                When I open my door

                And put my foot in it.

Weekend Update

To catch up…

Friday I took down red lentils with star pasta and Snickers candy bars. (Er, in separate plastic bags.)

Chatted with Cheryl the Kitchen Lady and got the number for someone who is organizing comfort trips to greet protestors when they get out of jail. The poetry anthology at the park keeps getting stolen, so they’re asking people to email their poems to the guy organizing it. Crowded but good vibe, everyone seemed focused and determined and I saw at least one working group meeting. I always feel better when I see people sitting in a circle on the ground.

Someone needed help carrying boxes of apples and cider, three of us raised our hands but I was the only one who managed to keep up with the nervous donater. He looked around, scowling, “People aren’t volunteering as much as they did at the beginning,” he grumbled. I thought about it. When there are a handful of people, it’s easy to see how if something needs doing, You need to do it. When there are several hundred people, it’s easy to think Someone Else can do it.

My fix was to haul boxes out of the street to the police barrier, catch the eye of someone with empty hands, smile, and say, “I need you to take this box to the kitchen.” It looked like everything got where it was supposed to go, mostly, so I am satisfied with that.

I also got a pita from one of the carts. I had watched a video where one of the friendly food vendors had gotten his generator (which he had let the media people plug into for a price) confiscated. You only saw him from behind, his salt and pepper hair gently balding under a cap. I thought it was Rafi who sells me coffee and the occasional danish, but he said “No, it was my friend,” and gestured to the pita guy. So I went back to him, causing some consternation. “Wasn’t it good?” asked the guy who had been in line behind me. “No, it’s great!” I hastily reassured him, “And the cheese-steaks are good, too,” I said, feeling less out of my depth there.

Once he got his sandwich and I was on my own, again, I leaned in and handed the vendor a $5, “I saw the video where the cops took your generator. I’m sorry, thank you for helping,” and ducked away before we had to exchange anything too politically complicated. I ducked behind the cart to cross the street, and glanced behind me nervously at a movement, wondering if a cop would do me for illegal donations… but it was just the cart owner, waving to me through the window in the backdoor.

I hate being afraid of the police, but I love making connections with people I never had anything in common with before.

Saturday morning, I found out the car I was hoping to borrow didn’t have safe enough brakes, so I called a cab and brought a book. (Yea, Terry Pratchett! Snuff reminds me of Thud.) Long ride later, got dropped off on the other side of Broadway by the Red Cube (as opposed to The Red Thing… outdoor art essentialized by the occupation… very practical, no?) and hauled three pans of roasted vegetables, 5 Ziploc bags of split pea soup, a box of salad fixings, and a big box of warm donated clothes to the Kitchen and Comfort tarps, respectively.

Then I tried to leave, but the handcart I was carrying got in my way. Plus, I got handed a purple harmonica for a performance art piece that was going to happen at 2 pm, so I decided to stick around for that.

I tried to interact with Sgt. Shamar Thomas—he is even bigger in real life than he is on YouTube. I had thought he just happened to be near short people in Times Square, but no. He is Just Effing Huge. However, at the moment I could have maybe caught his eye, the kitchen mic checked and by the time I was done repeating their words, he was gone. *sigh*

So I moseyed up the stairs, chatted briefly with the info guy—he’s been at that table, he said, for 48 days. That man needs a coffee. If I had been less sleepy, I would have been more coherent. I tried to convey my appreciation for his dedication, anyway, but I think mainly I expressed my exhaustion. Oh well, I hope it was as favorable an impression as I meant to impart…

Then I stumbled onto the button guy! I’ve seen pics of him since fairly early on. There are other folks selling buttons, but he has a table and a button maker and markers. He has a lot of buttons, and makes them as they get taken, but you can also draw your own button that he will stamp and it’s all donations. While I am uncomfortable buying a t-shirt for $10, I’m happy to *donate* $20… so I did, and got 20 buttons. Now I can wear my Occupy Wall St allegiance even when my t-shirt is in the wash. Joy!

I figured that since the t-shirt people I had frequented before were no longer there, I could at least start sending thank-you buttons to the people who have donated money to the chip in cab and Costco fund. (So, people who have donated… I will contact you in the near future when I have some brain and see if you would like to share your mailing address with me in exchange for a button or two.)

Then I realized that I was resenting the hand truck—so I asked the button guy if he could use it. (I accidentally bought two. Long story.) He was all excited, so we had a win-win about that and I felt less guilty taking twenty of his buttons. In fact, in the future I will probably take more because I’m already down five… I just kept meeting people who needed buttons! :*)

In a tickled frame of mind, I stumbled upon Legotti park—the Occupy Legoland “encampment” that I’d again, seen pictures of but not actually seen in person. It was adorable. I asked if he could use storm troopers—but he said he had plenty of police, and was trying to use less of them. I snickered, “Ah, de-escalating?” …And he had solved an earlier problem, managing to re-create The Red Thing in Legos. Very impressive use of plastic.

The kitchen area was the most defined, but I worked out where the Medic area was by the green-faced Lego lying under a blanket. Giggle.

I chatted with some tourists and then it was two pm and time for us to breathe through our harmonicas next to The Red Thing. I felt like a train, I felt like an artist, I felt heard.

I thought about marching to Foley Square in the golden autumn light… but I didn’t have a protest buddy with me, and a friend was coming over to our house, and I hadn’t slept right in ages… so I came home.

But first I watched the march pass me, breathing in and out through my harmonica, and waved to the Peaceful Grannies and all the other people, laughing, chatting, shouting, walking, being present and presenting themselves to be heard.

Can you hear us?

Compost

I am taking compost to the garden today. The vegetable scraps have been happily rotting away in many plastic bags outside my apartment door, damply waiting for me to haul them to the big black bin in the corner of my plot at the Two Coves Community Garden.

The garden is the reason I have friends who live in Astoria Houses, our local big public housing project. The garden was planted in an abandoned park that was made out of an abandoned lot that was an abandoned garage that some of the first break dancers used, all in the shadow of Astoria Houses.

The people who live in Astoria Houses were the first people in my life to fear cops for a good reason. Auntie Luscious explained to me that when they have a problem, they don’t call the police, they call the fire department.

Cops bring guns; if cops come, they take someone to jail; they harass people who sit down for being black in public… Firemen, on the other hand, put out fires. They calm heated tempers. They are local heroes.
 
All that, and they’re cute, too.

I was shocked when I first heard these stories. That is not a life I have to live. It isn’t part of my experience.

But I think part of this Occupy Experience is stepping out of the ILife and into the WeLife… I mean, police brutality has not been a part of my life; the government took care of me when my parents didn’t. I have many fond feelings towards The Man. But. There are others—many many others—who have been hurt. And rather than dismissing the hurt as unreasonable or provoked or “If you didn’t dress that way, if you would just change your behavior, if you would just try being a slightly lighter color of skin”…

Why do I/we ask the victims to change? Why don’t we demand the bullies change?

I am taking compost to the garden today, and it will change into strong, healthy dirt over the winter. I love the garden, though I’ve been neglecting it lately as I cook and read and cry and write about Occupy Wall Street. But I love the garden, what it has done for me and for my kitchen scraps—it has connected me with a larger community, it has given my kids a place where they can dig in the dirt without finding dog poop, it’s given my carrot tops a purpose besides landfill.
 

The garden was rescued from falling back into cutbacks wasteland by the man in this picture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31167233@N08/6178857967/in/set-72157627744225952

Ok, so there are a lot of men in this picture. Look at the man in the red windbreaker. Do you see how he has taken the arm of a young man in hipster glasses, and is using that man’s arm to punch him in the gut? In the next picture in the series, the young man is knocked backwards, his feet in the air.

Somewhere in the tussle, he loses his hipster glasses.

This series of pictures are the pictures that made me a radical defender of the occupiers. I had already brought them some supplies; I had already committed to help out as and when I could. I was in that very march that the photographer captured, but in the back because my short legs and my seven year old’s even shorter legs couldn’t keep up with the young, quick, determined men and women at the front.

But I wasn't going to obsess about the occupation, I wasn't going to write essays about it, I wasn't going to talk about it with other people and try and convince them what the protestors were doing was important to anybody else.That would be rude.

But when I got home, and rested, and checked to see what happened next… I saw those pictures. That young man in black hipster glasses is named Garrett, and he helped start what has become the Two Coves Community Garden.

Not all by himself, mind. A small group of dedicated people carried buckets of water to the garden and weeded and tended it the first winter it was occupied. I wasn’t there for that, but I admire those people who did not abandon the barren triangle of awkward saplings and broken promises in the cold or the dry.

This winter, we have over a hundred plots, over 150 regular gardeners, and we host cultural and community events throughout the growing season.

The garden wouldn’t be here today if Garrett and his friends hadn’t been there that winter. I wouldn’t have a plot in the garden, if he hadn’t been in the garden one Saturday in early July, 2008. I asked how to get a plot and he said, “How about this one?” and I said, “Yes, please!” and handed him twenty dollars and my email address.

So when I looked at those pictures-- over and over, trying to understand how a man in a red windbreaker could hurt skinny, harmless Garrett, smash him into the ground, crush him-- I teared up. I went from thinking I would support the protestors because they were supporting me and my children's future, to a more intimate sense of solidarity. I am not helping them; we are helping each other.

Garrett is human. He is not good at leading meetings or saving email addresses. However, he is really good at creating and protecting a space to enrich the earth and grow more beautiful plants. I am human, too. I don’t know what nature will do to my radical heart or to the movement this winter. I expect we will change. But I hope that, like Garrett’s other project, we will enrich the earth and grow into more beautiful and happy people through it.

LOL

Why I think other people make better Occupiers than I do:

My friend J’s little brother A is at Occupy Wall Street, and last night around midnight a woman walked through camp wearing a very fancy dress and a very fancy coat and carrying a sign that said, “I’m the 1%. Thank you for paying my taxes.”

Now, being a suspicious and surly cuss, if I had been there (which I wouldn’t have because what woman in her right mind walks through a campground that is reported to have recent ex-cons and current drug addicts and other unpredictable people IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT with nothing to defend herself but a sign on a stick? [which, come to think of it, is suspicious in and of itself because the cops won’t let you march with signs on sticks because someone might get a splinter] so) I would have snorted and started looking around for the hidden camera.

But A is one of those people blessed with a more even temperament than me. Which is good, we need more people like that. Especially with hidden cameras rolling. Because…

She sidled up to him, “Thaaaank you for paying my taaaaxes,” she oozed.

“You’re welcome,” he said, and complimented her on her outfit.

“Thank you,” she cooed, “It’s my 1% dress.”

“It’s very nice,” he said, “But it looks a little cold.”

“Oh, but I have my 1% fur to keep me warm.”

“Yeah...Oh I see you have your 1% diamonds also...Lady, I think your boyfriend lied to you. Those really are only 1% diamonds."

Poems from the first ten days

I wrote these during the first ten days of the occupation, back when it sounded like we were all looking for demands and not, as it turned out, for each other.

The last one in the series was my favorite, and what I wrote after four Occupiers came to my kitchen and cooked a meal for 200. I brought it to Amy Kitchen Lady, and she read it at the General Assembly the second Thursday of the Occupation. (I was pretty chuffed that my sentiments were echoed in the first Occupied Wall Street Journal, I must say... I wonder if that writer heard my poem, or we just all found the same words for our shared transformation.)

My one demand

Is for a happy ending

Right here, right now.

Allow compassion to surprise

Cops and robber barons both.

Live with it, the staggering heart-ache of

Ever after.

My one demand

Is not to force me to choose between

Dreams and America or between

Death and Taxes.

Let me just breathe a little bit.

Each grateful breath a love letter to the future. My

Child’s birthright is

Liberty, love

And

Solidarity. I will

Shout myself hoarse over and over.  I would rather lose my voice than my freedom.

My one demand is to back

Off. Stop

Telling me what I must pay and what I must sacrifice.

Here is the truth: I am a mommy. I

Eat lies for breakfast and sit patiently until the truth comes.

Resistance is childish.

Sit in time-out until you learn to share properly.

I have

Made my demands in

All the ways they told me to:

Give this candidate money.

Invest your own time: AmeriCorps, phone banks, sign petitions, write letters. VOTE.

No one listened.

Enough with my demands.

This time, I am trying something different.

Helping, marching, shouting, feeding.

At Liberty Square, the 99% are trying something different.

This time, we are listening to each other.