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Work 4 Peace,Hold All Life Sacred,Eliminate Violence! I am on my mobile version of the door-to-door, going town-to-town holding readings/gatherings/discussions of my book "But What Can I Do?" This is my often neglected blog mostly about my travels since 9/11 as I engage in dialogue and actions. It is steaming with my opinions, insights, analyses toward that end of holding all life sacred, dismantling the empire and eliminating violence while creating the society we want ALL to thrive in

Monday, September 03, 2018

My big mistake...

I totally spaced the holiday so I can't find a ymca that is open nor a library but I did find a Fresh Thyme. We don't have Fresh Thyme's in the west as far as I know but I really like them in a pinch because, although their organic section is very small, it is fresh and often cheaper than Whole Foods. But mostly because they have a very private section with chairs and tables in the front of the store with free wifi and plenty of electrical outlets. The very best feature of this part of the store is the height of the tables that line one wall: you can easily stand and work - or lean on the tall stools. I hate to sit and write, especially after driving most the night through driving rain and horrid humidity to land in sunshine, humidity, 100 degree heat and no open y's!

I've spent the good part of the heat of the day here - not catching up on my blog, but putting out emails and answering emails for future readings/gatherings/discussions.

I also finished the editing for my 3rd printing of 100 books, at least all the editing I'm doing this time - the first 15 or so chapters. I'll focus on the last 15 or so chapters for the next edition. I have to get a rush printing anyway because of all the readings I've scheduled this weekend...

So I'm in the middle of gmo corn-on-crack corn fields, mega farms and green rolling hills, getting into my truck after avoiding waves of white male anger coming from the revving engine black truck parked opposite me when I notice an older white womon in some kind of sedan has circled past me twice, staring openly and in disbelief as she goes around my truck.

She finally parks two spaces down from me, grabs her large shoulder bag, and comes strolling over. I've rolled down my window but I open the door and start to slide out but she's already there expressing her wonderment and firing questions at me.

At first I can't tell if she's a positive or negative, she's so taken with the fact that I exist, my truck exists, and asking me how I came into this existence. I tell her about 9/11 and thou shall not kill, and then the rest. I'm pretty sure she is trying to smile but is gaping so broadly it's hard to tell.

Margaret, she says, when we exchange names, who has lived in Indiana all her life. She is small, in an old lady dress, curiosity overcoming any misgivings she might have talking with a stranger so different from her church friends, I imagine. She is catholic, pissed as hell with bishops and even the pope, the one and only pope I actually occasionally like.

She finally confesses how deeply her faith in knowing the truth has been undermined, how hard for her to know who to believe, who is telling lies, she's given up. But she adds hastily - even before I tell her believe in womyn - she believes me and everything written on my truck. She has had a hard life - her eyes leave mine and I know she's talking about church-condoned male violence - although she's quick to assure me her life is better now, she has survived.

I guess she is one of the 64% of old white women who voted for tRump and so I ask her. Her eyes bore into mine as she angrily tells me it was such a big mistake as he hasn't done anything she thought he would. I ask her, as I always do, what did she think those things were, that tRump was going to provide us.

She waves her hand turning her head in disgust, causing a flash of brilliance sparkling in the weak but still hot rays of the setting sun off her ring of diamonds, temporarily blinding me. Because he wasn't a 'politician' (just a fuckin billionaire, I mumble under my breath) she considered him one of the 'normal' people who wouldn't lie like politicians.

I don't ask her "when has a rich man done anything for you" but between her ring, her sedan, and her health she perhaps has had a rich man doing many things for he. 

I have to ask her how could she, as a womon of indeterminate (to me) age although I would guess late 70's, given the only opportunity she's ever had in her entire long life to vote for another womon, how could she choose not to?

She shakes her head sadly, protesting she didn't know until recently about how many concentrated lies the media was spreading about Hillary. "It was really both of them together, the Clintons" as if they're inseparable like water and wet - which I don't point out the internalized sexism in holding a female candidate responsible for her husband...grrrrr - that, well she believed they had murdered so many to get so high in politics, that they were 'traffickers' and all around evil people.

Did she think about what tRump did to become a bazillionaire?

While she's talking, she riffles through her pocketbook - the one hanging over her shoulder - and pulls out a little red purse that she opens and takes a $20 bill to hand to me. I ask her if she wants a copy of my book but she hesitates and appears so uncomfortable, I wonder if she reads. She wants to know if I sell it. I nod, hold up her donated $20 and say she's already paid me for it.

She promises to read it and pass it on to her womyn's group at the church - the womyn's group who have been talking about nothing but the betrayal of the men of that church, a conversation I'm sure womyn have had over the eons. Maybe that's why womyn became nuns and isolated themselves from those men in the first place. What do I know.

I encourage her to bring me back to do a reading/gathering/discussion with her whole group - I'm very mobile!