While waiting for the 14 with mom, I dipped into Oasis for a cold one. The woman behind the counter, also a mom, was happy to chat about my day, so I told her about mom being this anti weapons-in-space activist, newly self-educated on the drones issue. Our signs are about drones. We're heading to the march.
I yak with mom about Jerome's observation that Newsweek got a facelift and has left Time in the dust when it comes to good journalism. Resolving to check it out for myself, I dipped into Powell's on Hawthorne (no bus was immanent) heading straight to the magazine rack through Fresh Pot. I couldn't find either mag. "They must be too mundane" I joked with the cashier, buying 2600 28:3 instead. Freddies probably has Newsweek. Maybe tomorrow.
I used to do this (engage in protest marches) from my stroller, same town, same mom, protesting A-bombs and strontium-90 in the milk, other Cold War Craziness [tm]. Those were the early 1960s, pre-Beatles almost. I reminisced with Matt at Hopworks tonight about president Kennedy getting shot. We were 5ish.
The march snaked around the downtown, including through PDV a few times, about 3500 people. We started near Arlington Club (where Applewhites stayed), where I chit chatted with Quakers. Peter Ford, Audrey and Jim Metcalf... Josh was in his medic role (at the Occupation too maybe). Lindsey and I both have colds (we're not here together, just criss-crossing paths).
Darren Kenworthy and I did most of the march (a walk) in tandem, discussing history and philosophy, while weaving paths with mom and her WILPF friends.
Trevor's new book, Portland Memorials, has mom's name (Carol Urner) on page 88, from the Walk of the Heroines memorial at PSU.
Our posters were on the esoteric side, is what I was telling the Oasis lady. Something about War being Hell in the Heavens on the one side, pictures of weird models of drone, including tiny ones, on the other.
A former school district head from Seattle stopped to check my level of God consciousness. He had lots of stories. He was worried the use of religious terms on my sign might signify some disrespect for religious teachings (I disrespect many religious teachings, as well as secular). We had a good long friendly discussion, ending up talking about a role model in Costa Rica.
I'd been mentioning in passing on a physics list today (University of Buffalo) about Oregon drones (drones Made in Oregon). We'd like to sell them to civilians even more, for civilian uses. They're pretty cool (some of them). Why buy into the hellish distopian nightmares the monkey-brain politicians are purveying? "Are we not men?" Who needs them to dictate our future?
My educated guess is the 99% would prefer not to retreat to some Rocky Mountain apartments before pushing the buttons to end it all, how about you? I know some soldiers who wouldn't mind trying their hand at civil services either, the kind of job many already have in their current occupations (not all military jobs are especially violent, or some are but only through side effects).
Engineering the destruction of obsolete and no longer safe buildings is something many young people have gotten good at.
The by-now-old idea of a Peace Dividend seems semi-rational. Remember Beyond War? How about ending hunger by 2000? Do we despise these former hopeful selves? Why should we? I'm still for Project Renaissance, after all these years.
Speaking of Project Renaissance, note how I talk up the similarities between Greenpeace and NATO, in the sense that we were talking using paramilitary tactics. The environmentalists, with their high powered boats on Animal Planet, sparring with the whalers, are a sight to behold. Kids love getting these role models from adults.
I don't see NATO doing anything that inspiring and wouldn't mourn its dissolution now that it has had its day. "Said the professor".
Tara had a driving lesson with Elizabeth Braithwaite today. She's agitating for a gym membership. I quit all such memberships in the dire straits chapter.
Check out the new head shop down from Hopworks, same mall. That makes four within a few blocks. Leaving Amsterdam to bear the brunt has been a hallmark of PNW cowardice, the way some people tell it at Angelo's.
I'm back to browsing again. My realization, talking to Daren, is the university life style is pretty good for some people, and a goal of many out of college is to recreate something of the living standard. That means a lot of access to information.
Having hypertext, which I prayed for in the 1980s, after Princeton, means browser-wanderers like me can kick back on a Saturday night and watch old anti-Nazi cartoons, by Disney, Looney Tunes and others. There's lots to enjoy in cyberspace, in culture more generally.
Matt talked a lot about old plays and movies, a walking library of allusions. deFunkt was actually staging one of the plays he talked about. I'll get a picture of the poster, upload it to Photostream.
