Saturday was a day of firsts for me: I participated in my first protest march and took public transportation in Los Angeles for the first time. Turns out, both were pretty frigging awesome. Let’s start with the march. I am not your typical protester. For starters, I tend to treat angry confrontation like the plague. Best to avoid at all costs. And second, I am claustrophobic in crowds. Think racing heart, sweaty hands and an overall feeling of “Oh god, I’m going to barf”. So, you might ask, why did I think it was a good idea to participate in a protest, even a peaceful one, that was estimated to draw 100,000 women to downtown LA? I mean, was Donald Trump really going to care?
The answer to the latter is a resounding “No”, but that wasn’t really the point. I marched because I decided that it was more important to show up than worry about a panic attack. I marched because change will only happen when we all get a little out of our comfort zones and take action. Any action. No matter how small. And I marched because I am frustrated that, as a woman, my voice is deemed not important by this administration. Clearly, I was not alone in these feelings. An estimated 750,000 women, men and children flocked to downtown LA early Saturday morning via Metro, bus, bike, foot and car. To say that we “marched” is a bit of a oxymoron. There were such a traffic jam of people on the streets around Pershing Square that it was really more of a stand. But oh, what a powerful stand. There were grandmothers and mothers. Daughters, wives, sisters and friends. There were men, children and dogs. There was black, brown, white and everything in between. Like LA, it was a gathering pot of different, united in the common goal to be heard. In short, it was lovely.
There were so many things about Saturday that blew my mind (the cleverness of the signs for one), but what amazed me the most is that the event never became nasty, bitter or violent. At one point, as I was squashed in the midst of tens of thousands of people who’d finally realized that they couldn’t move either forward or backwards, I had a moment of panic when I thought: “This could get ugly”, but it never did. It remained peaceful, positive and life affirming. Which gives me hope.
I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next four years. My guess is that for me, personally, it’s going to get ugly. Not only am I a woman, but as a self employed writer, the Affordable Care Act has been a life saver. Literally. But I do know that you can’t put progress back in the bottle. The current administration will try, and, on many fronts, they may succeed. But I think only in the short term. I was talking to my friend Gaye Nelson, a truly gifted astrologist, about the “Age of Aquarius” which we are entering after a 2100 year stint in the age of Pisces. It marks the dawn of a whole new identity. Not just as individuals. Not just as a country. But as a world. So, I think it’s important to ask ourselves: Who do we want to be?
Change is scary, but no revolution happens without it. And I don’t need a crystal ball to know that this weekend was the start of a revolution. So come on ladies. Let’s lace up those tennis shoes and march on.