Signs at the Women’s March in D.C.

LOVE CONQUERS FEAR  At the Metro Station: pink hats, state signs, cheering, patience at the kiosk, and once on the train, the soft singing of “This Land is Your Land.” Changing trains. Packed in.  NORMALIZE EQUALITY  Getting off at the Capitol South stop. Walking through mist and the Capitol building appears like an apparition in the fog  HEALTH CARE IS A HUMAN RIGHT  Workers disassembling the inaugural grand stand, trash everywhere, fences coming down, rows and rows of locked porta-potties from Inauguration Day  GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE FUN-DAMENTAL RIGHTS  At the stage two hours before the program is to begin. Native American ceremony to the side. My growing awareness that I’m uncertain and uneasy. Where are the unlocked porta-potties? How crushing will the crowd become?  TOLERANCE OF SEXUAL ASSAULT IS AN UNPRESIDENTIAL ACT  I don’t see any provisions (water, food) and while I have thought to bring tissues, hand sanitizer, EpiPen, phone charger, ibuprofen, and Metro map, I didn’t bring any food or water. I get lost in these thoughts while simultaneously keeping hold of my fourteen-year-old daughter because the crowd is growing moment to moment—it is like people are sprouting up from below and dropping down from above.  LOVE THY NEIGHBOR  No choice but to walk a long distance, opposite direction of the crowd flowing in. At a Walgreens we buy granola bars and bottled water.  I’m aware we’ve lost our prime location next to the stage.  STOP TWEETING START LEADING  Rows and rows of unlocked porta-potties.  REAL MEN RESPECT WOMEN  Walking back with the flow of the crowd. We get filtered and crunched into a spot on a side street, and we have a view to a big screen set up on Independence Ave.  FREE MELANIA  Standing inside the crowd. One hour.  IMMIGRANTS MAKE AMERICA GREAT  How many speakers are scheduled? Do we really have to hear from each organizer?  That’s not a very productive thought but it’s really hard to keep standing here.  LOVE IS LOVE BLACK LIVES MATTER CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL  I know my daughter doesn’t feel good.  OUR BODIES OUR MINDS OUR POWER  Two hours. It becomes a challenge. How many speakers are they going to have?  THE CAPITOL IS NOT A CHURCH  Internally I am on a kind of auto-pilot, pushing away the uncomfortable idea that I am inside thousands of people and there is no easy way out.  WITHOUT IMMIGRATION TRUMP WOULD HAVE NO WIVES  Big screen is harder to see and has become almost impossible to hear.  WE STAND WITH PLANNED PARENTHOOD  Shifting. Trying to make sure my daughter has a view.  MR PRESIDENT WILL YOU IGNORE ALL OF US?  Lines of people occasionally snake forward or backwards. Now I’m glad we’re not by the stage. That would be entrapping.  KIND IS THE NEW SEXY  Young people climbing trees. Popping out of a line of bushes to sit on top of a wall.  WHAT MERYL SAID  Shushing in the crowd to try to hear the malfunctioning speakers. Shouts of “signs down” so we all can see.  NOW YOU’VE PISSED OFF GRANDMA  Now my daughter really doesn’t feel good.  <NASTY WOMEN>  Can’t hear much at all, but there are some moments—luckily Michael Moore comes through pretty clear.  MAKE AMERICA GAY AGAIN  Loud cheering. It is Gloria Steinem. Leaning into my daughter, speaking into her ear after she asks, “Who is that?”  KEEP YOUR LAWS OFF MY BODY  This is getting to be difficult. People are polite and conscientious. But still. And how many more to speak? Will we actually march? When will the crowd move? Will it remain this patient and polite?  WE SHALL OVERCOMB  My daughter has a terrible backache. She is trying to tough it out. She wants to know when the actual March starts.  LIFE LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS  The women in front of me, inches away, start eating peanut butter sandwiches. I don’t know if I can handle this. I breathe in a restricted way. Sensory overload. NO HUMAN IS ILLEGAL  We decide we need breathing room.  I WILL NOT BE SHOWERED WITH HATE  We make it over to the edge and I make a quick porta-potty visit. Someone is sitting on top of it, and it rocks a bit as I squat without touching the seat and try to keep my aim.  NOPE  We get into a counterflow and make it back to a central spot on the Mall, where there is more space.  WE STAND ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS AND WE WILL NOT BE SILENCED  Sense of relief. Taking pictures. I see a man in his sixties calmly standing in the middle of everything, holding his sign at his chest, and I take a picture of him. “I am here because I have four daughters.”  PLANET BEFORE PROFIT  This is more like it. We are walking around and observing smaller individual marchers (socialists) (ACLU) (students with facts about climate change), and also the roaming extreme Christians (small group) with their signs saying that women who get abortions and gay people are going to burn in hell.  DISABILITIES ARE RESPECTED  People seem cheerful, even joyful. There are dogs, babies in strollers, young men with signs for free hugs.  AMERICANS NEED HEALTH INSURANCE THE RICH DON’T NEED TAX BREAKS  We take a long break for lunch. The restaurant is packed, slow service. I feel as though we have broken off and are floating on a small island. A small, privileged island where a Caesar salad costs fifteen bucks.  ALL OPPRESSION CREATES A STATE OF WAR  Bikers for Trump float rolls down the street in front of Ford’s Theatre.  HANDS OFF OUR HEALTHCARE AND FREEDOM OF CHOICE  Cell phones charged and service back after being clogged. Texting with two old friends who are at 14^th and Q St. We power walk 1.7 miles to see them for a few minutes before they have to catch a cab to get to their bus taking them back to Penn State.  NO WALLS  Power-walking along the curb. Back on the streets that are open. Traffic. Sirens. Exhausted marchers.  GET YOUR TINY HANDS OFF OUR RIGHTS  Coffee shop. Real bathroom. Taking our time. Metro at Dupont Circle.  WE THE PEOPLE ARE THE POWER  I can finally think again. I experience a feeling of complete saturation. I am aware that I have absorbed an incredible amount and my body is physically experiencing it. I don’t have any real thoughts but one word keeps occurring to me: Democracy.  IN OUR AMERICA LOVE WINS  Back on our big island of privilege, the Hilton Garden Inn near the last stop of the Metro.  MY SCHOOL IS A GRIZZLY-FREE ZONE  Cab ride. I know he is taking the long way back to the hotel but I don’t care. We are chatting with him about how Uber is affecting the taxi business and how hard it is for him. He has a strong accent and is hard to understand. He grew up in Maryland. He speaks positively, without complaint. We can tell how much he loves his home here.  FEMINISM: THE RADICAL NOTION THAT WOMEN ARE PEOPLE  Back in the room, looking at the news, checking pictures on my phone.  ENDANGERED: WOMEN PEOPLE OF COLOR LGBT FACTS  I had become obsessed with taking pictures of signs.  THY SWAMP RUNNETH OVER  Time for a snack and drink. Another island of privilege.  NO ONE IS FREE WHEN OTHERS ARE OPPRESSED  Talking to my husband and daughter. He talks about his perception of layers, a consciousness that had grown over the day. The layers of our place in the crowd. Another layer of experiencing D.C. Another layer of turning on the news at the hotel and seeing what was happening in other U.S. cities.  LOVE TRUMPS HATE  This is happening around the globe. We are a part of the world. Don’t wall us off.  LOVE NOT HATE MAKES AMERICA GREAT  Our daughter is spinning madly and giggling in the chairs of the Hilton lobby. She’s still just a little kid.  YOU CANNOT TAKE MY RIGHTS I’M STILL USING THEM  Chatting with the bartender. Her name tag has her name and her hometown: Hong Kong. She talks like an American girl and says “like” a lot.  WE LIFT EACH OTHER UP  My husband tells me that when the program started and the screen/sound was clear, as an Indigenous singer began with a song, that he was crying. Tears streaming down both cheeks. The beautiful, echoing, haunting voice.  RESPECT EXISTENCE OR EXPECT RESISTANCE  My brother texts that he was watching for me on C-Span.  MY PUSSY IS NOT UP FOR GRABS  When our daughter is not listening, my husband and I confess to one another about our private trepidation of the morning, uncertain about what was going to happen, taking our little girl into that kind of crowd, the unpredictability. And then our relief as we experienced, from the first moments of being on an overcrowded train, the politeness, the shared sense of purpose.  IF YOU’RE NOT MAD YOU’RE NOT PAYING ATTENTION  One idea working at me, nagging at me, was about how just a single person was on the other side of this. By the end of the night, I know this isn’t true. This isn’t just about him. He has been voted in, and so he is a representative of ideas. Troubling and so many wrong ideas.  THIS PROTEST IS MY VOW TO BE ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY  Texting with my mother so she knows we are okay. She writes, “What an experience for all of you but especially for Iris. She will never forget this day.”  TRUMP CONGRESS SUPREME COURT ARE YOU LISTENING?  In bed, looking forward to sleep. Plans for the morning, when we won’t drive the 300 miles back home. We need another day.  I DO NOT CONSENT I WILL NOT COMPLY  My daughter wants to visit the Holocaust Museum and the National Archives.  HOW LONG IS THE FIGHT FOR HUMAN DIGNITY  Sleep is coming on readily. I am drifting. My thoughts are pulled apart like warm taffy. But there is one word that keeps coming back to me.  WOMENS RIGHT ARE HUMAN RIGHTS  Democracy  HOPE