How do you not feel the urgency….to work to save life?

               I’m sitting in whole foods in Austin, the Berkeley of Texas, so I can connect to the internet and figure out how I’m going to get back to Las Cruces in a timely fashion when two obviously wealthy younger white women sit down at the table next to me and begin talking non-stop about each others’ real estates and design businesses.

            The language they use in working to inspire people (you need/deserve a change), the framework they engage to get people to follow them (we’re real, you need to join us, you can’t afford not to), the urgency they express to increase their success (life is short and we have what will make you whole) – are all tactics and strategies we might utilize to move people to work to save lives on the border. I wanted to throw up. I couldn’t believe for a solid 45 minutes they talked nothing of reality, nothing of destruction of our planet, nothing of caring about all the people who could never begin to afford their business nor utilize their resources.

            But most of all, nothing about their complicity in the deprivation of and violence against their/our neighbors let alone Mother Earth.

            I wanted desperately to roll my eyes with another whole foods customer at least or at best join in their conversation. I did neither. Finally, they stood up and gave each other that pushed back booty hug where two people stand as far away from each other as they can and still do the brief arm-around-the-shoulder, cheek-to-cheek hug.

            Having no one to share my horror and frustration with, I decided to talk with Amy, even though I only had access to her because of the proximity of the tables here. As she turned to lean in toward me, she smiled broadly shrugging shoulders in an ‘oh it’s totally alright’ gesture when I told her I didn’t want to eavesdrop, to overhear her conversation, her eyes brightening with that salesperson potential customer hope. I tried hard not to even desperately wanted to ignore their conversation, but I couldn’t help it and frankly I don’t understand how they could talk about such not simply just unimportant things (like do you really care if you’ve ‘upgraded’ to the latest whatever or make the cover of… ) but the things that are contributing to the destruction of life.

            I shared with her that I just returned from spending two weeks at the border and the contrast is so painful. I’m curious to know if she’s ever gone, living so close and all.

            Her blue eyes went as wide as they could without her painted eyebrows moving and she tried to thank me for going there and helping the ‘underprivileged’. She employed her salesperson voice with words that are meaningless as she assured me she knows how dire things are environmentally as well and she’s always happy to learn more.

            I let her know I don’t want her thanks, I want her body on the line with mine. I point out her obvious wealth that she first tries to smile and deny until I tell her about the people released from ICE custody who have a black plastic bag with all their worldly belongings and she agrees she has more compared to them.

As if.
I corrected her characterization of the people on the border as “underprivileged”, they are not. They are attacked and are fleeing from our corporations’ and our military’s invasion into their country. I tell her how many countries we’ve attacked and created over the centuries so that we can be a wealthy country and so she can build and tear down and redesign houses while others are forced to live in refugee camps – or homeless encampments here in Austin.

I talk about her obvious organizing and people skills and ask her to consider turning them to helping us save lives and life on our planet.

I let her know her friend’s language about the underground railroad and ‘slaves’ was very painful to hear: I reiterate these were people, human beings, as today, who were also attacked, enslaved, and fleeing from white businessmen and enslavers.

Amy tells me she’s open to refining her language to be less offensive. I add "and less racist."

            She doesn’t leave in a huff or tell me to mind my own business but again is gracious as she says she’ll think about our conversation and share with her friend.

            I hand her my Brownsville reading flyer with my contact info on and let her know I’d love for her to organize a book reading for me with all the people they were talking of inviting to learn how to painlessly make more and more and more $$$$ seminar.

            She doesn’t say no or yes but she promises to think about it – the consummate appeaser.

            And now I’ve spent my time writing about her instead of getting myself together to leave Texas.

            But really, how do amerikkkans not feel the urgency to ACT NOW and how come those who know the dire necessity of acting now, how come we don’t have the words or tools or whatever it takes to spread mass actions, mass movement?

            I look around the tables here and see people, some eating, some chatting, some sharing food with their children, some playing chess, some reading and wonder if I should go table-to-table and ask them the question that has baffled me since 9/11: what is that thing that will make you say ENOUGH! BASTA! I will no longer go on with life as usual. I write about this in my book: when I would wake up, hear the news and the latest atrocity, throw on my clothes and jump out the door into the streets expecting mobs of people flooding the streets, unable to tolerate the latest violence, refusing to be distracted by ‘normal’ life.

            What is that one more thing, that tipping point, that will allow us to tear down our loyalty to obtaining the’things’ promised by the amerikkkan nitemare and switch to the commitment to protecting lives and life?