I finally made it down to Occupy Wall Street last night. I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to get down there. I think – and I do not mean this as any kind of insult, because there so many different kinds of people down there. Really! All ages and races, all these people finding their way to the same place from so many different directions. All the little kids, so beautiful. And the human microphone is so righteous – I hesitated going because I fear the drum circle.
I remember living in Seattle in the 90s and going for walks in Volunteer Park in the middle of the day and stumbling upon drum circles and it freaking me out. Boo! Here’s a drum circle. Even though I was heavily invested in hallucinogens at that point in my life, and was really in no position to judge anyone on appearance and life goals (there I was, also, in a park on a weekday, not working or doing anything of substance, definitely not occupying anything), I still stuck my nose up at the drum circles.
I wanted to scream: You are not tribal! You are from Connecticut. And you grew those dreadlocks starting your junior year at Colgate. Please, for the love of god, take a bath.
Of course Occupy Wall Street is not about any of those things. (Well, maybe it some point it was a little bit, and definitely some of the participants might need a bath by now.) It feels really exciting down there, even if sometimes it seems like the mainstream media is not necessarily acknowledging it as such. But these are the days when we are glad the internet exists. Like I really liked reading this post which debunked the notion of antisemitism at Occupy Wall Street. And I love this video. And I have found Gothamist to be a good source of information. Twitter, too. Oh yes, twitter. There are all these things I would never know about if I only read the paper and watched the news. Maybe it’s too much information, but I am glad I have it.
People are really angry, and they are correct in their anger. I’m still not sure what’s to be done about it. I wish someone would tell me because I do not know myself. I want to know how it all ends! I predict a happy ending. We could all use a happy ending.
