Yesterday I had the distinct privilege to be among the thousands of people at the Women's March on Washington. It was a singularly amazing experience.
It began with hundreds of people trying to get on the Metro at our stop, so many people that lines for fare cards stretched out toward the entrance and when the train arrived it was already full. We were able to squeeze on, however, no one else could get on the Metro for the whole rest of the way into the city. As a person who now rides the Metro everyday, I can confidently say that it was the nicest gathering of smooshed metro riders I have ever seen. Once we transferred off the red line to the green to go to Patrick's mom's house, which was near the march start, we sat for quite awhile because there were so many people needing to get off the Metro that the platform was packed minutes after a train would leave.
While on the train, my friend Kay who came in from Arizona for the march, noticed a woman with extra pink hats in her bag. Having divorced myself from social media after the election, I didn't know until it was far too late for an attempt at knitting that pink hats with ears were part of the rallying cry, so I was pretty bummed to not have one for myself and the girls. This woman's mother had made extras so she provided hats to Evie and I and her last hat to my friend's son (Izzy acquired a hat at the end of the day courtesy of her auntie Vivi). It was such a sweet gesture and to me exemplified the spirit I felt all day.
As we exited the Metro people were passing out signs to carry. We hadn't prepped our own, however, we had come up with some good ones. From the simple: This is what a feminist looks like to He is the worst of us to I refuse to live in a post-fact era. It is good that last one didn't make it onto a sign, but I was pretty fond of it :)
There was quite a crowd at Nicole's house, but we didn't linger for too long because Evie needed to be back in Kensington for her basketball game and we wanted to have the kids see the march/rally but not spend too much time participating both for safety reasons and just the practical reason of standing like sardines when you are less than 4 ft tall is not that much fun. We all made it to just off of Independence and 4th street by about 11 am, but really from there couldn't hear the speakers. After about a 1/2 hour Patrick and the kids took off and Kay and I were on our own.
Over the next hour or so Kay and I slowly weaved our way through the crowd to Independence Ave just after the air and space museum to place where at least I could see the screens and we both could hear what people were saying blocks and blocks ahead of us. (This was one time I was thankful to be so tall, I think I would have been even more claustrophobic if I had been anything less than 5'10"). The first speaker we could almost hear, as we were weaving through the crowd slowly, was Michael Moore, but honestly all I caught from that speech was him telling folks to run for office and having the crowd recite a phone number, I am assuming it was for some politician.
At one point it occurred to me that I sent Patrick back with all of the snacks, a lament I voiced out loud to Kay. Immediately I had three different women around me offering me some of their snacks. Awesome. (I wasn't actually hungry then, but figured I should eat something when I was offered). We made it to the place were we could see in time for speeches by democratic members of congress, Alicia Keys, Angela Davis, and, of course, Madonna. The rally portion of the march definitely started to drag on. The things people had to say were inspiring, but after three hours of standing more or less in the same place the crowd was definitely ready to march, with some folks (including) us starting to move out of the crowd and toward Constitution ave and others standing and still listening.
By the time Madonna sang we had migrated to the end of the air and space museum and were slowly but surely heading for the national mall. It was really nice to make it to the mall, as it was the first time in about 3 hours that we weren't shoulder to shoulder with other people. At this point I think it was about 2 pm in the afternoon.
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| The white is the special covering the NPS put over the grass... and the scapegoat of the inauguration crowd "debate" |
From the mall we headed over toward Constitution, but for some reason the intersection was blocked by police and national guard so we had to go up Constitution and then we were able to head down Pennsylvania. It was walking toward Pennsylvania that we ran into my former boss from when I lived in DC before... that was pretty wild.
The march then proceeded down Pennsylvania, the same route as the inaugural parade the day before, but this time instead of bleachers filled with Trump supporters it was bleachers filled with marchers taking a rest or just taking it in. Every side street off of Pennsylvania was also filled with people up at least a block. It was incredible. As we marched people called out "This is what democracy looks like." And "We need a leader not a s@*ty tweeter." And "We will not go away. Welcome to your first day."
As we walked past the Trump hotel people started shouting "Shame, Shame, Shame." Importantly though, throughout the march people were perfectly peaceful.
We continued down Pennsylvania until the turn before the White House, at which point it was almost 5 pm so we decided to turn left instead of right and started the walk back to Nicole's house. It was a long walk, so we made a pit stop at the Forest Service building (I had brought my ID figuring that would be a handy place to pit stop). We made it to Nicole's by 6 pm to pick up the things we had left there, hung out for a bit and then made the trek back home. The metro was still quite crowded, and delayed because of the crowds, but the people on the metro were no less exuberant. It took us almost 2 hours to make it home. What a day!
This past weekend her team, the Dribblin' Divas, had their first game. I
am pretty sure it was also the first ever game for at least half of her
team. The other team, on the other hand, were not only a good head
taller than 90% of Evie's team, they were also ridiculously good. With
just four girls, who certainly were all 5th graders, compared to Evie's
all 4th grade team, the opponents trounced the Divas 56 to 0. The team
did play really well for a bunch of newbies though and I just hope that
this loss doesn't dampen Evie's basketball spirits!
