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At long last I’m getting around to writing about my summer trip to the beach. Since it expanded to five days and I did a lot, I’m going to write a multi-part series starting with the events leading up to my trip.
Lately I’ve been feeling all sorts of angst. Much of it had sprung from the news. Russia decided to kick off 2022 in a spectacularly bad fashion by invading Ukraine in late February right after the Winter Olympics had ended. There is a growing rise of this horrible right-wing faction in my own country that was based with a toxic combination of Christian nationalism, white supremacy, and unbridled capitalism along the admiration of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin and it was all concentrated in the Republican Party. I’m seeing it played out on social media where people are posting all kinds of stuff that has led me to get more stressed out. Even TikTok has been infected with this and it was the place where it had focused on people doing silly dances and showing off their toy collections.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind hearing testimony from people whose lives have been impacted by the recent Supreme Court’s repealing of Roe vs. Wade. But I have seen seeing so many stories of women who needed abortions as a result of rape or incest, women who had ectopic pregnancies who had to travel out of state beecause some states had even banned the procedures for those kinds of pregnancies (never mind the fact that an untreated ectopic pregnancy can kill both the mother and fetus), and similar stories that my mind began to suffer from information overload.
It’s not just abortion I’m hearing about. I’ve heard stories about increased threats against people of color and LGBTQ people and similar stuff. Plus it’s also the midterm elections this year so I’m hearing disturbing stuff about Republican candidates.
Social media had become so toxic and draining that I recently had to set time limits on my smartphone’s social media apps because I would spend too much time scrolling through posts full of doom and gloom when I should’ve been working on more productive stuff (such as my art and tidying up the house). I started doing this a week before my Ocean City trip and my mind began to feel clearer and less stressed after just a few days.
There were other reasons why I felt I needed a vacation. One was I unexpectedly saw my ex-husband for the first time in over a year. I went to a local farmers market and I was looking for parking when I saw a familiar looking man but I wasn’t sure who it was. He had very long curly hair that was dark with streaks of grey hair and his beard also looked long and unkempt. His stomach had such a pronounced bulge that he looked like he was four or five months pregnant. He suddenly turned around and I got a shocking look at his face.
I’m glad I was in the car when I saw him because I don’t know if I could handle reacting to him if we had physically ran into each other. Try to imagine a hermit who has been living in a cave for the past 10 years who was subsisting on an unhealthy diet with very little exercise and you’d get my ex-husband. After I saw him I began to ask myself what had I ever seen in him but then I had to remind myself that he didn’t always look this way. When he was with me he used to take pride in his appearance and personal grooming. It seemed like ever since he left me for one of our friends with a long history of severe mental illness he has let himself gone literally to pot. I don’t even know if the person I fell in love with when we were both college students at the University of Maryland even exists anymore.
For nearly a year I’ve been taking a series of online classes that are offered through Google and Coursera where I would get an IT certificate. I had finally taken and passed the last exam needed in order to finish my last class in the program. There are additional lessons but they are all on how to finding jobs in the IT field along with helpful hints. I know I should be doing those lessons so I would completely finish that class but there was something else that was calling me to return to Ocean City, Maryland.
I realized that I still had free time to do whatever I wanted without having to consider someone else’s work schedule. If I find a traditional 9 to 5 corporate job, my ability to go on vacation would heavily depend on how generous the company would be with leave time. I know there is a trend in people working from home with flexible schedules, which was the result of the Coronavirus pandemic over the past two years.but there are traditionalists who are clamoring for a return to the traditional 9 to 5 workplace where everyone has to be in the office and there’s a chance that I’ll land such a job.
Basically I decided to put off taking the last lessons for a week just so I could do one last vacation before I have to go back to work because I don’t know when I’ll get the opportunity again. I dipped into my savings from my late mother’s life insurance policy to do this. Since I was dipping into savings, I couldn’t afford some lavish vacation so I decided to go back to Ocean City.
Last year I went back to Ocean City for the first time in 10 years. I spent three days there. Day one I traveled there. Day two, which was the only full day I had at the beach, was seriously marred by the arrival of the remnants of Hurricane Ida. I had planned on going swimming that afternoon after driving around the area on a very hot morning only to find the sudden arrival of clouds. I tried to go to the beach but the winds were very strong so I got grains of sand striking my face and the water was too choppy to swim in. I managed to go to the boardwalk but it was seriously truncated due to the high winds. On day three the temperature had dipped so low that it was too chilly to do a quick swim in the ocean before checking out. You can read that saga in full detail (along with pictures) right here.
This year there had been several very hot days with temperatures in the 90s so I was feeling a desire to go back to the beach. I decided to spend five days, from Monday-Friday. I figured that the chances of at least one day where I could go to the beach.and take a dip in the ocean would be higher. But I really couldn’t afford to go for all seven days so I decided to just go on the days when most of the locals would be at work. (I know from past experiences that Ocean City tends to be a bit more crowded on the weekends with a mixture of locals, weekend beachgoers, and people who were staying there for all seven days.)
At this point I’m going to break up this text-only post with a video that was written and performed by my late high school music teacher Tim Landers and his band, The Landers and Heinz Project. It’s called “It’s a Shore Thing” and it’s all about Ocean City. (If you want to learn more about my experiences with having Tim Landers as my teacher, you can read this post that I wrote about him way back in 2017.)
If you like “It’s a Shore Thing,” you can either download it or stream it online (depending on the platform in question) from AllMusic, Amazon, Apple Music, Shazam, Spotify, and Qobuz. Now moving right along to the rest of this blog post…
Just like last year I decided to use Expedia.com to book my trip. I decided to choose the Thunderbird Motel because I stayed there last year and I was impressed with the service and cleanliness and the rates were relatively affordable to me. Everything went without a hitch like last time so I decided to do the booking on a Friday afternoon and I planned on spending the weekend preparing for the trip by doing things like the laundry (I needed clean clothes) and digging up my swimsuit.
I even signed up for EZ Pass. I tried buying an EZ Pass transponder (it’s supposed to be sold through both the MVA and Giant) but to no avail. But I discovered that Maryland has a new program where you can register your car’s license plate and tie it with a credit or debit card and you can travel through the EZ Pass lanes without needing a transponder. I decided to go through with it just so I could avoid the stress of driving through EZ Pass lanes without an EZ Pass. (I found out the hard way that Maryland made all of its toll roads EZ Pass only. Once again, you can read more about it right here.)
But then something happened that made this trip more stressful than it should have been. Part of it was my fault. I got an email from the motel and I didn’t open it right away because I figured that it would be the same email that I got last year where it had the details on when I could check in and whether I needed to wear a facemask before entering the office. The following day I was busy with doing stuff around the house and I had my smartphone on vibration only so I didn’t look at it very much. By the time I checked my email and smartphone (which indicated that I had a voice mail message_ it was late Saturday afternoon. Basically both messages said that there was a hold on my debit card from the bank and I needed to get it squared away if I wanted to keep the booking on my room.
By the time I called the motel the office had closed (it was Saturday night). I called the following day and they confirmed that they couldn’t get my debit card number through and I needed to call the bank. The bank was closed on Sundays so I had to wait until Monday, which was the day I was supposed to leave for Ocean City.
I didn’t do any packing that weekend because I thought that there’s a chance that the trip would fall through and I didn’t want to pack a suitcase for nothing. I still went ahead with doing the laundry because I needed clean clothes no matter where I was going to be.
To be continued in my next blog post.
Other Posts in My 2022 Beach Vacation Series
Prologue
My 2022 Trip to the Beach Day One: July 25, 2022
My 2022 Trip to the Beach Day Two: July 26, 2022
My 2022 Trip to the Beach Day Three: July 27, 2022
I recently completed a crocheted amigurumi fox that I made especially for the annual auction at my church last Saturday. It wasn’t easy. I had started making the fox but I had only managed to complete the head and ears when my church was looking for items to donate. I decided to donate a few hats I had recently made with my knitting looms along with the amigurumi bunny that I had made last spring. (It was also the same bunny that I submitted to the Retro Town Fair that was held during the Greenbelt Labor Day Festival and I won a third place ribbon in the Needlework category that was based on both that bunny and another crocheted amigurumi that I had also submitted to that fair.)
Even though I hadn’t finished the fox, I decided to submit that fox in the auction as well. I figured that having a deadline would push me to finish that fox. Unfortunately I hadn’t predicted that I would have work where I’m currently helping a therapist with the preparations for a series of webinars that she’s giving to teachers, counselors, and administrators of the DC public school system. With that work I wasn’t able to pace myself with the crochet fox project. On top of it there was my ongoing participation in Inktober this month.
As a result, I literally spent most of my free time this past week doing a lot of crocheting so I could finish this fox on time. I was sewing the various body parts together just a few hours before the start of the auction. I finally finished with sewing the head to the body just one hour before the auction began. I managed to squeeze in some time taking photos of this fox before I headed off to church.
I used a pattern that I downloaded for free from the Craft Passion site. What really slowed me down was that there were times when I had to alternate between orange yarn, black yarn, and white yarn, so I was constantly changing yarns. I was literally getting stressed out as I was finishing this fox just hours before the auction.
I also managed to take some photos of the hats I had knitted using the knitting loom. Unlike the fox, I had been knitting these hats over the past six months or so. Those hats went on sale with hats and mittens that were made my other church members. Our church has a tradition where it sells hats and mittens starting with the auction and it continues to sell these items after Sunday service until mid-December. Whatever doesn’t get sold is ultimately donated to homeless shelters and other groups that help the poor.
I was totally shaken as I arrived at the church and dropped off my handcrafted items. I started to eat the finger foods that the church provided. Between the stress and the food that I ate, I began to feel physically sick. I ended up leaving the auction early without bidding on anything. I’m not disappointed at not being able to bid on anything mainly because I’m still financially struggling and I really have to be very stringent about watching my money. At least I managed to shoot this photo of my bunny and fox on display together before I left.
I later learned that they were both sold so I’m happy about that. After what I went through, I vow that I will never again put any handcrafted items up for an upcoming auction or a sale of any kind unless it is fully complete or is about 90 percent complete. I had put unnecessary stress on myself and it just wasn’t good for me.
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Lately I’ve been getting antsy because I’m still banned from driving so I have to rely on the kindness of others to drive me around. On top of that, the vast majority of my trips have been to the physical therapy and/or the lab to get my blood drawn to make sure I’m taking the right amount of blood thinners. There were a few times where my husband drove me to a nearby cafe so I could do some web surfing on the laptop using the cafe’s free wi-fi.
But I’m getting worn down both physically and mentally from my recent ordeal. There are so many events that I read about either online or in the local paper that I would’ve loved to check out in person but I can’t because I either 1) need a car, 2) I would need to take the Metro and I would have to deal with the system’s constant problems with broken elevators and broken escalators (which has been a chronic problem for many years—every week there’s at least one station with this problem), or 3) would require a lot of walking and I haven’t regained my full stamina yet.
One such example was the annual Crafty Bastards festival in Washington, DC that took place yesterday. Getting to the location would’ve require a Metro trip to the Columbia Heights Metro stop then taking a 10-15 minute walk to the location. Once I got there I would have to do more walking to check out all the booths and displays. If I was healthy that would’ve been no problem for me. With my current health condition, there was no way I would’ve even considered it.
The only silver lining to missing Crafty Bastards is that the weather has been really sucking lately. It has been raining constatnly every day for at least a month (with some days resulting in torrential downpours while other days it’s an occasional drizzle with dark clouds) and yesterday was no exception. I would’ve felt really pissed about missing Crafty Bastards had the weather been one of those glorious sunny fall days with low heat and low humidity.
I’m also getting tired of my husband nagging me to do my exercises and walks. I know he means well but it’s starting to get on my nerves. On top of that, he acts like I’m totally blowing off doing what I need to do in order to get well and I’m really not. I know I have to do the physical work and there is no other alternative but I wish I wouldn’t be subjected to his constant reminders because it really gets old. There are times when I call him Mr. Bossypants after this Tina Fey book because he can be so bossy about getting me to walk and exercise.
Yesterday my husband did some errands while I was stuck home. Lately I’ve been getting my Internet fix by playing around with my new smrtphone (a Droid 3) but the only catch is that I”m limited to just 2 GB of data usage a month. Yesterday I got a text message from Verizon warning me that I have used 75% of my alloted data usage and if I go over 2 GB my husband and I would have to pay more this month. I know I’ve been using the smartphone to web surf way too much but keep in mind that I had surgery three weeks ago so it’s really no coincidence that my data usage is a bit on the high side. All I have to do is be very careful about not doing too much surfing on the phone until October 16, when the whole data usage gage will flip back to zero.
When my husband found out about the warning yesterday he became really irritable and started kvetching about how expensive it will be if I go up to over 2 GB and yadda yadda yadda. I know that my health problems have been a financial drain but at least we have health insurance so we aren’t going to be thousands of dollars in debt. I really wish he would feel sorry for me regarding my recent health problems and loosen that tightwad pole that’s permanently stuck up his ass just a little bit. (I’m not asking for much. Seriously, I’m not.)
Today I skipped church because I was tired so my husband went off to church without me. Since he’s currently the church treasurer he spends Sunday afternoons doing things like pay the church’s bills and stuff like that. Naturally I was left home alone for the second day in a row with my only method of accessing the Internet is a smartphone that’s on the verge of hitting the 2 GB ceiling.
But then I decided to take matters into my own hands. I packed my computer laptop into a bag, took my walking cane, and walked 1.5 miles to the nearby cafe so I could do some web surfing using the cafe’s free wi-fi. I’m at the cafe right now as I’m typing this. When my husband arrives home, he’s going to freak out that I’m not there because my car is still parked outside yet I won’t be home. 😀 Hopefully he’ll realize that I am capable of doing my own walking and exercisisng without him nagging me and leave me alone.
I do feel exhiliarated because just three weeks ago making such a walk would’ve been very painful, especially with the very lousy weather. (My hip used to hurt worse whenever it rained.) But thanks to taking painkillers prior to the walk, my only obstacle is fatigue. But I toughed it out and arrived at the cafe.
The only downside to the walk is that it took me much longer to get there than before my hip injury. I’m also pretty tired and I have another walk ahead of me in order to get home. (The local Metrobuses don’t run on Sundays in my neighborhood, so riding on one is out of the question.) I’m just going to have to wait until my husband call me on my cell phone wondering where the hell I am. Boy won’t Mr. Bossypants be surprised!. 😀
I also did something for myself this morning. As you may know, I have to wear these white TED compression stockings in order to prevent blood clots. I’m required to wear them for 22 hours a day. I can remove them for one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening in order to give my skin a break but I’m generally stuck with wearing them almost all the time. This morning I woke up at 6:30 a.m. because my TED hose started to pinch some skin in one of my legs so I decided to remove both hoses (which I can do with the aid of the grabber so I won’t violate the ban on bending my body more than 90 degrees) then go back to sleep.
My husband went off to church but I was too sleepy to remember that I removed the TED hose and I needed him to put them back on me. By the time I realized what happened, my husband was gone and I had no TED hose on my legs.
So I came up with a solution. I took the TED hose and placed it on a foot device that I use to put socks on my feet without bending over. I put my right foot through the TED hose and the foot device and it worked really well. But the swelling had completely gone down in my right leg to the point where it’s now looking normal again.
I repeated the process for my left leg and there was a snag where it was stuck on my calf. My left leg is still swollen (although much of it has gone down) so it’s no surprise that I wasn’t quite as successful.
In desperation, I decided to cheat on bending the body beyond the 90 degrees and quickly pulled up the TED hose. I decided to use the classic “Five Second Rule” that is generally used regarding food spilled on the floor. (Basically if you pick up the food within five seconds after dropping it, you can still eat it because it’s not quite as germ-ridden as leaving it on the floor for several minutes.) I figured that if I bend the body beyond 90 degrees for just five seconds, I could quickly pull up the TED hose without damaging my left hip implant. Well it worked.
I’m not going to tell my husband because he would really freak. Besides, I really love seeing him putting my TED hose on me since he chants stuff like “FUCK TED! FUCK TED! FUCK TED WITH A SANDPAPER CONDOM UP HIS ASS!” Sometimes he’ll even revert to alternating between the “FUCK TED!” chant and Quebec French profanity, which is really hilarious. I would miss it if my husband, Mr. Bossypants, made me responsible for putting on my own TED hose.
For the next few days I’ll be showing some of my work at the Artdromeda event located in Baltimore’s Pigtown district. Visit the official website for details and directions.
I’m at this point where feel like I’ve bitten off more than I can chew. I’m going to backtrack so I can explain why I feel overwhelmed.
I was thrilled when Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert decided to do their rally on the Mall in Washington, DC on October 30. I had sold some of muy political-themed jewelry at the One Nation Together Rally at the Lincoln Memorial on October 2 and I did pretty well. I sensed another profit-making opportunity and I decided to make some more jewelry for that event.
At the same time I decided to make a submission for Art Outlet’s Day of the Dead-themed Ofrenda show. It was a juried show and I was a bit curious as to whether I had the talent to make that show despite going through a hip replacement and long recovery followed by going through my mother-in-law’s sudden death earlier this year followed by being on constant travel for family reasons followed by frequent separations from my husband because he is constantly flying between Maryland and Florida for his job.
In addition, I learned about a non-juried show happening in Baltimore called Artdromeda. (It’s the same event that happened in May. Artdromeda happens twice a year.) At first I thought I wouldn’t be able to participate because my husband and his sister had decided to fly out to Phoenix at the same time to go through their late mother’s things. But then my husband said that I didn’t have to fly to Phoenix if I didn’t want to and I have had enough of out-of-town travelling this year. (Since I started this blog on January 6, I’ve been to the west coast of Florida, Phoenix, Phoenix again, New York City, Ocean City, Connecticut, the east coast of Florida, and Western Massachusetts. In addition to those trips, my husband and I spent the anniversary weekend in Baltimore but it wasn’t quite as far from home as the other places we’ve been.)
I felt so happy that I didn’t have to go to Phoenix that I went ahead and signed up for that show as well. My biggest mistake was that I didn’t consider the overlap with the Ofrenda show and how it could possibly affect my preparations for that show.
The Ofrenda show had opened the same weekend as the Stewart/Colbert rally and I was preparing for two events at the same time. I finished setting up for the Ofrenda show in Alexandria and I felt a sense of accomplishment until, that same night, I got an e-mail saying that mother had to be suddenly rushed to the hospital. The good news was that she had suffered from a urinary tract infection and it wasn’t anything worse. But she now has to spend a few weeks in a rehab center because the infection had left her very physically weak.
In the meantime I had promised to help my church with an art show while I was preparing for the Ofrenda show and DC rally and before my mother was sent to the hospital. Our church usually hosts artwork from local artists in the Meeting House sanctuary where Sunday services are usually held. The artwork is rotated every month or so regular worshippers are always treated to new eye candy. (I worship in a Unitarian Universalist congregation and idea of seeing different artwork that’s also for sale is the one thing that sets it apart from more traditional-minded houses of worship that owns permanent religious art that is on display all the time.) Well, the Visual Arts Committee had an artist who cancelled an upcoming show so there would be a few weeks where the walls of the Meeting House sanctuary would be bare and, with the white walls, would appear bland and would be noticed by the members.
So the Visual Arts Committee had hurriedly put together a show featuring works of art by the members of that committee. Since I had recently joined that committee, I was not only eligible to submit work but I volunteered some of my pieces. Right now I have three of my own pieces currently on display in the sanctuary until December 5. Then I’ll have work in the subequent show, which highlights the art from members and friends of our congregation and it won’t be limited to just members of the Visual Arts Committee.
If all that wasn’t enough, my husband was preparing for his business trip to Florida. I managed to call and visit my mother. I also attempted to sell some jewelry at the Stewart/Colbert rally but, as I wrote in my October 31 entry, there was such a scrum of people that I had a difficult time finding a suitable place to set up shop. I wasn’t able to make the official Ofrenda kick-off event that began the same afternoon because the Metro was clogged with people going to the Stewart/Colbert rally and my church congregation had scheduled this big Mexican-themed Ethnic Dinner for that same evening.
A week later I was invited to donate some more art for a special fundraising auction that was sponsored by artdc.org. The pieces would be displayed from November 7-19 with the auction happening on November 20. I sensed an opportunity to unload some excess artwork that is just cluttering up my home so I made the donation last Sunday.
Well, I thought I could juggle everything. However, my participation in the Artdromeda show nearly fell apart because I forgot to program the dates of the site selection for that event into my iPod Touch and I ended up missing the required site selection. I called the organizers yesterday and explained my situation with my sick mother and they were understanding. Last night I was allowed to make a site selection on the condition that I bring my art with me ready to hang.
By the time I arrived at the place there were few empty spaces left but I was able to pick a decent looking site. But it was located in a narrow hallway so there was no way I could put up this small portable table with some business cards and this diorama that I had created just for that event. So I jettisoned both the table and the diorama (since the diorama couldn’t be hanged on the wall) and I ended up sticking the small box containing my business cards on the wall with several pieces of artist tape. (It seemed to be sturdy when I tested it before I left the place last night.) Then I discovered that I left the nails I had planned to use at home so I had a hammer and artwork but no nails to hang the artwork to the walls with. I tried this convenience store that was located near the place where the event is taking place but I had no luck. I then remembered that there was also a Dollar General store that was also located nearby so I tried it. The good news was that I managed to find a pack of nails on sale for $1.50. I was totally relieved because I would’ve had to make a special trip to either a different neighborhood in Baltimore or drive out of the city and into nearby Brooklyn or Glen Burnie in search of a hardware store if I couldn’t find anyone who sold nails in the Pigtown neighborhood of Baltimore.
In any case I managed to put up some of my smaller artwork with the space that I was given. I was so drained when I finished that I drove back home, bought some carry-out fried chicken from a Popeye’s near my home, then watched the first episode of Countdown With Keith Olbermann since Keith Olbermann returned from that notorious two-day suspension that resulted in total wankerage all over the World Wide Web, the newspapers, and television.
So I now have four simultaneous art shows going on at the same time. One of them have officially ended yesterday but I haven’t heard word on when it’s okay for the artists to pick up their money and retrieved their unsold art. The second one will run from November 11-13 and the organizers of that show has stated that we are to pick up our unsold art on November 14. The third one will run until November 19 with an auction happening on November 20. If I’m lucky enough, my donations will be sold, and I won’t need to pick anything up. The fourth one will end on December 5 but I’ll at least have some breathing room for a while yet. And these four shows are happening simultaneously with my mother’s recent hospitalization and rehabilitation.
I feel overextended taking part in four shows at once. As I’m looking back on all this while writing this down, it seems like madness that I’m putting myself through this. I’m hoping that I can sell a lot of my art because I’ll not only have an emptier house but I’m hoping whatever money I make will compensate for something that could potentially be happening next year.
You see, the recent mid-term elections have resulted in the Republicans taking control of the House of Representatives. The Republican politicians have vowed to shut down the government just like Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich succeeded in doing so in 1994. My husband works for NASA and he and his co-workers will definitely be sidelined because of stupid political maneuvers. So I feel like I have better get a head start of what could happen because I know that if the worse does happen, I can forget about selling any art because it’s a known fact art expenditures are among the first thing that gets cut from a family’s budget. I want to sell my art, unload the excess art cluttering up my home, and make some money that I would save just in case the Republicans do succeed in shutting down the federal government and my husband will be sidelined for God knows how long.
I only wish I could juggle four shows at once much better than what I have been doing. On top of that I also have to deal with my mother being in rehab. I am currently overextended but I can’t quit now.
Today I will have some free time that I will take up in going through some art-related items and see what to donate to this special collection my congregation is organizing this Sunday to benefit this public high school that’s also has a well regarded arts magnet program. I just learned that the school is also looking for fabric (for costume making and other fabric art-related projects) and costume jewelry (for stage performances). After he returned from his business trip in Florida and before he headed off for his Phoenix trip, he became unusually bitchy about how cluttered the house was and I was afraid that he would have a meltdown. (I think his frequent travels are starting to get to him.) I figured that if I get rid of that bin of remnant fabric that I’ve purchased a few years ago but recently came to realize that I purchased more fabric than what I could really use, I’ll have more space in the house.
I also have to prepare for my church’s annual auction this Saturday night. I’m donating a few of my dolls mainly to get rid of them. (I’ve had them around the house for a few years and they have been displayed at various art shows and craft fairs in the past with no sellers.) I’m also donating that Mickey Mouse Vinylmation toy that I purchased blank during a trip to Walt Disney World and customized myself (see the September 2, 2010 entry for details and photos).
Okay so now I’m juggling a husband who’s out of town (and I have to pick him up at the airport this Friday night), a mother who is in rehab, four art shows, gathering of art supplies for a drive to help a public high school arts magnet program this Sunday, and a church auction all at the same time. Just reading what I wrote in the last sentence has me questioning my own sanity in taking on so much at the same time.
Yesterday I was part of something that was really massive even by DC standards. I’ve been living in the DC area since my days as a journalism student at the University of Maryland at College Park and during my student days I attended my first large protest march against the Reagan Administration’s policy towards El Salvador. Over the years I’ve attended all kinds of large scale protests and rallies. Twenty-five years ago I attended my first–and last–Fourth of July celebration on the Mall (which turned out to be the last time the Beach Boys gave a free Fourth of July concert on the Mall). I also attended a few of the Smithsonian Folklife Festivals and Smithsonian Kite Festivals on the Mall. All of these events paled compared to what I saw on the Mall.
I had an inkling that something historic was taking place when I drove my car to the Greenbelt Metro, which is the end station on the Green Line. I saw cars parked in the nearby office park while people were taking a long hike towards the Metro station. When I pulled up to the lot, not only did I saw that it was crammed to the max but I saw a very long line of people snaking from the station towards the back of the parking lot. In all the years that I have been going to marches, rallies, concerts, and other large-scale events, I have never seen anything like this before.
I decided to go to the Prince Georges Plaza station, which is two stops further in on the Green Line. The parking garage had plenty of cars but it was easier to find a parking space and get into the station.
Getting on the Metro train was another matter. I barely got on an already packed car. Throughout the ride to the Archives/Navy Memorial station, we were all packed in the car like sardines as more and more people got on the car. The good news was that everyone on the station took it in good stride. In fact, a group of people were briefly singing "Old MacDonald Had a Farm", which helped calmed this small child dressed in a cute lion costume who was crying in her father’s arms at times. (The father also gave the girl sips from his bottle of Gatorade and she even held that bottle at times, which also calmed her.)
When we got off at the Archives/Navy Memorial station, we had a hard time getting out of the station since there was such a large bottleneck. When I got up to the upper level, people were trying to get downstairs back on to the platform because Metro officials had told them that someone had left a suspicious package near the exit gates and they were urging people to get back on the train and get off at the next station. (An impossible task at best.) After a few minutes, someone in my crowd yelled "LET’S STORM THE GATES!" and people began to get back to the exit gates. We were eventually let out. As for that suspicious package, I have no idea what the real story was about that and this morning’s The Washington Post didn’t mention it.
So we were walking down 7th Street, N.W. while I was shooting footage of the masses with my portable video camera for a few minutes. Then I put the camera away and I pulled out my portable sign with my jewelry that I was going to sell at that event. One guy spotted my sign and I managed to sell him four of my jewelry. Finishing the business deal got pretty gnarly with throngs of crowds walking around us while I was getting change for that guy’s $20 bill and giving him the jewelry. It was a miracle that I didn’t lose anything. Once I finished the transaction, I thought it would be more prudent to not to try to sell anything else until I got to the Mall itself and I could settle down in a spot with my portable chair (like what I did with the October 2 rally at the Lincoln Memorial).
As I crossed Constitution Avenue, N.W., the traffic of people had slowed considerably. When I finally reached the Mall, it was extremely crowded. I saw an official info booth but I wasn’t able to reach it because it was packed with so many people.The Mall on opposite sides of Constitution Ave., N.W. were packed with people and it was literally standing room only. (I saw a few adventurous people climbing up in trees and on traffic light poles in order to get a better view of the stage.) I decided to try cutting over to the other side of the Mall then walk up towards the Native American Museum. Except once I reached a certain point, I couldn’t get anywhere anymore and throngs of people were pushing to go back the way I just came.
While I was trying to push my way through the throng, I heard that Jon Stewart had just taken the stage. I looked around and I didn’t see any jumbotrons or any other giant screens. I was able to hear the audio but it wasn’t always clear. I would hear a sentence or two but sometimes the audio seemed a jumble. I heard Stephen Colbert take to the stage and, again, I could hear a sentence or two but the audio wasn’t always clear.
At one point I saw the Park Police riding their horses going right through 7th Street, N.W. while people were in the street trying to make their way to the rally. Every time a cop on horseback came through it created an even bigger bottleneck than before. The only time I was terrified that whole time was when the cops and their horses were going through because I feared that the horses would suddenly freak out, rear up on their hind legs, and acutally injuring someone. One cop actually yelled "DO NOT TOUCH THE HORSES! STAND BACK!" There were so many people that I really couldn’t see any reason why the cops were subjecting the horses to the masses like that.
After a while I just gave up and I felt a sudden desire to get out of the packed crowd. So I went into the stream of people who were pushing to go in the opposite direction and just kept on pushing my way in the people current until I got to the side of the west wing of the National Gallery of Art building on 7th Street and Constitution Avenue, N.W.
At that point I pulled out my portable chair and sat down. By that point, I heard Ozzy Osbourne play his classic hit song "Crazy Train". (In fact, it was easier to hear the music than to hear the spoken parts of the rally.) I was pretty exhausted by then and I decided to eat the lunch that I had brought with me. I was glad I packed that lunch the night before because I walked past a few food vendors on the streets and every single one of them had this atrociously long line. As I began to reach for the bottles of Cherry Diet Pepsi that I had purchased at a convenience store before I headed towards the Metro this morning, I realized that I had left the soda in my car back at the Prince Georges Plaza Metro station. So I ended up eating my lunch with nothing to drink it with.
After that, I just sat in my portable chair for the longest time while I watched the people, many of whom were decked out in costumes and holding all kinds of crazy sign parodies. (I particularly remembered a guy dressed like Abraham Lincoln holding a sign saying "Ban Guns in Theaters!" Another person held a sign that said "My Political Beliefs are Too Complex for a Sign!")
I heard The O’Jays play their 1970s hit song "Love Train" and a few people were even dancing. I pulled out my iPodTouch because I had downloaded the free official app the day before and I tried to access video feed of the rally only to discover that I couldn’t even get a clear wi-fi signal where I was. I knew that there was a Starbucks located a few blocks away near the Archives/Navy Memorial station where I could’ve gotten a free wi-fi signal but I was afraid that the place would be crowded as all hell. So I just sat there.
I was so exhausted that I didn’t even pull out my jewelry and attempt to sell anything. It didn’t help that I left my caffinated sodas behind in my car. I just couldn’t muster up the energy to sell my wares, which was one of the main reasons why I even attended this event in the first place. I began to groove to the energy of the crowds. Everyone there were peaceful and very polite to each other, which was amazing to see. I began to wonder if this is the kind of positive vibe that people who attended Woodstock back in 1969 experienced. Woodstock was a crowdfest just like yesterday’s event and people there were mostly peaceful even as they had to endure three days outdoors and it even rained heavily at one point. Most of the people who attended Woodstock tended to recount fond memories of being there, even if many of them couldn’t see or hear any of the musical acts. (Recently I saw the movie Taking Woodstock, which was a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the planning of that event.)
I’m starting to think that yesterday’s event was just like Woodstock without the mud, the rain, and the brown acid.
Sure, I could’ve forced myself to sell my wares and I personally know certain people who would get on my case for not taking advantage of the sales opportunity I had yesterday. (Fortunately my husband isn’t one of them. He wasn’t mad at me for not being a more aggressive saleswoman pursuing profit at all costs and he was completely understanding.) But I ended up enjoying myself more just experiencing the positive moment while watching people wearing goofy costumes and holding up equally goofy signs.
I was also happy because I had seen photos of aerial footage of Glenn Beck’s August 28 rally at the Lincoln Memorial and I think yesterday’s event drew an even bigger crowd than Beck ever did. This morning’s article in The Washington Post seemed to confirm my suspicions on this. My husband had watched parts of the rally at home on Comeday Central and he thought it was way bigger than Beck’s event. (I feel mildly tempted to tune into Beck’s Fox News show tomorrow either on television or online to see if he would respond to yesterday’s rally but I’m not sure if I can really stomach doing that. I currently have this enduring fantasy of Glenn Beck having a complete and total nervous breakdown over the fact that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s joint rally drew an even bigger crowd than what Beck could muster.)
To be fair, I have to admit that yesterday’s event outdrew the One Nation Together Rally at the Lincoln Memorial on October 2 as well. As I look back on that rally I think that it was inevitable that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert would outdraw Glenn Beck because both of them have larger followings than Glenn Beck. Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show alone draws a bigger audience than Glenn Beck’s show or any other political pundit on any of the three major cable news channels (Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC). To be honest, I don’t think a liberal political pundit like Keith Olbermann or Rachel Maddow could’ve pulled off a major counter-event to Glenn Beck’s August rally on the same level that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert did.
By 2:30 p.m., I decided to take the Metro back to Maryland because I knew the rally would end at 3 p.m. and I really feared battling the majority of the people who stayed there to the bitter end. I missed the first subway train that went by because the cars were already filled to the max. Then there was an annoucement over the intercom at the station that urged people to try moving to the farthest side of the platform where they could board the front of the train. I took that advice and walked towards an area on the platform where the front of the train would stop. Sure enough, I was able to get on the next Metro train with no trouble. That car was standing room only but at least I could get on.
My car got more and more crowded as it stopped at more and more stations picking up passengers. Everyone took it in stride, just like they did on the trip going downtown.
I was glad that I had cancelled a planned appearance at the official opening for Art Outlet’s Ofrenda exhibit, even though my art is on display there. Travelling to Old Town Alexandria on the Metro would’ve been extremely difficult given the number of people using the system for the rally on the Mall. (Driving to Old Town was out of the question since that area has a shortage of parking spaces.) It’ll be interesting to see how many people actually got to that event despite the crammed Metro trains.
My husband later told me that I missed a very moving closing speech by Jon Stewart. Fortunately, I was able to see the speech for myself, thanks to YouTube.
As I headed to my church for its Mexican Ethnic Dinner around 5:30 p.m., I drove past the Greenbelt Metro station and found that many cars were still parked in the nearby office park (where many people just parked there then made the long walk to the Metro station itself). When I arrived at the Ethnic Dinner, I ran into people who were also downtown at the massive rally earlier that day. One woman ended up arriving over an hour late because she had stayed at the rally to the bitter end then had a hard time getting on the Metro trains.
The Mexican food was good. The organizer made sure that people created traditional Mexican meals that one can’t easily find in a Mexican restaurant in the United States. In other words, no one made any tacos, burritos, or gorditas. The volunteers created more complicated dishes that Mexican families fix for special occasions and were rarely served in Mexican restaurants because of the complex prep time involved.
Even though I was very careful in avoiding dishes that contained ingredients that I was allergic to, I began to feel very nauseous to the point where I ran to the bathroom and vomited. I left for home as soon as I could and I threw up a few more times when I reached my home. I tried going to bed but I kept on experiencing frequent acid reflux so I ended up sleeping sitting up on the couch downstairs for the first time since my hip replacement back in 2008. (I slept sitting up on the couch for at least two months after my hip replacement.) That was the only way I could stop spitting up everything in my mouth.
I think all the stresses over preparing for the Art Outlet show, creating new jewelry that I ended up not selling for yesterday’s rally, submitting three works of art that’s currently hanging at my church (I’ll write more about that later), my mother’s latest hospitalization, facing huge crowds at yesterday’s rally, and overeating rich unfamiliar foods at last night’s Ethnic Dinner took a physical toll on me. I ended up skipping the special Halloween service at church this morning. My husband has driven himself to the airport and he is on his way to a business trip in Florida. I’m just going to rest today, enjoy Halloween, and try to catch any videos of yesterday’s rally on the Internet.
Last night, after I finished with installing my art exhibit for the Ofrenda event, I got word that my mother is in the hospital. She’s been struggling with neuropathy for the past few years and it has flared up badly enough to warrant a hospital stay. Once things stabilize, she’ll make another visit to rehab for at least a week (depending on how well she responds to physical therapy).
This has definitely put a monkey wrench into what was already gearing up for a very busy Halloween weekend. Last night I finished with installing my artwork for Art Outlet’s Ofrenda event at the Torpedo Arts Factory in Alexandria, Virginia, which will kick off late Saturday afternoon. I promised the Visual Arts Committee at the my church that I would drop off some already framed artwork for a special art show that my congregation is holding. I had already promised someone else at my same congregation that I would help with installing a Day of the Dead Ofrenda altar tomorrow that would be on display for a Mexican-themed Ethnic Dinner Saturday night that will be a celebration of both Mexico’s bicentennial and the traditional Mexican Day of the Dead holiday. On top of that my husband had volunteered to run the bar at that event. I had also planned on dropping in on Jon Stewart’s "Rally to Restore Sanity" event on the Mall Saturday while selling some of my political-themed jewelry (which had worked so well at the other march on the Mall earlier this month). On Sunday, my husband and I would attend a Halloween service at our church then I would take him to the airport, where he would be flying to Florida on a week-long business trip. Then I would settle in at home while giving out goodies to the trick or treaters who come to my door that night.
With my mother in the hospital, there will definitely be alterations to that schedule. The only things that can’t change are that my husband said he has to work the bar at the church’s Mexican Ethnic Dinner because no one else had stepped up to volunteer for that position and he has to get to the airport on Sunday because of his business trip. So far, it looks like I won’t be able to make it to the opening of the Art Outlet Ofrenda event that starts late Saturday afternoon but my art will be on display. As for other things on the schedule, it really depends on how well my mother is doing in the hospital.
Once again I will be out of town as of tomorrow. I will be in Western Massachusetts attending a memorial service for my mother-in-law who died in Phoenix back in March. Before my mother-in-law remarried and moved to Phoenix in the early 1990’s, she had spent the bulk of her adult life in the New York City metropolitan area where she was involved in both the civil rights and anti-war movements in the 1950’s and 1960’s, had raised her children in Garden City (located on Long Island), and she had once worked as a Head Start teacher on Long Island and as a children’s librarian in Ardmonk. Even though there was a funeral soon after her death in Phoenix, many of her friends living on the East Coast couldn’t attend for various reasons (many of them are elderly, retired, living on fixed incomes, and some of them have health issues) so my husband and his sister had this idea of having a second memorial service just for her East Coast friends. Even though I attended the funeral back in March, I’m expected to attend this service as well.
I know people reading this entry will think that it sounds strange that the memorial service will be held in Western Massachusetts even though my mother-in-law had spent her adult life either in Ohio (where she went to Oberlin College), New York (where she lived with her first husband and where she lived on her own after her divorce), or Phoenix (where she lived after she married her second husband) and she had never lived in the New England region. Apparently one of my mother-in-law’s closest friend sold her home on Long Island a few years ago and retired to Massachusetts (where her oldest daughter lives with her own family) and my sister-in-law immediately glommed on to the idea of holding the service there and no one else spoke up about another location. (Or maybe someone did suggest a location but it got vetoed, I’m not sure.) Finding hotel rooms in that area is not easy this time of the year since it’s the height of the fall foliage season there and many people go on fall foliage tours. It’s also not easy planning a service in Western Massachusetts since my husband and I live outside Washington, DC and my sister-in-law lives in Pennsylvania and everything has to be done long-distance.
I wish I didn’t have to do it because I had already paid my respects to my mother-in-law back in March when I attended her Phoenix funeral and I’m involved in an upcoming art show. Here’s some background. After spending lots of time preparing for the Pigtown Festival in Baltimore last month, my husband got me to promise that I wouldn’t work any more shows for the rest of the year. I would focus only on my online Etsy store while helping him with getting rid of some excess clutter around the house. Well, I made that promise but I’ve since broken it and I’m preparing for another art show later this month.
I got notice of a Mexican-style Day of the Dead art show in Virginia and it was being juried. I had an idea for an project and I sent in my application. I did it for the hell of it and I knew that I had a 50-50 chance of being accepted. I just found out last Friday that I have been accepted in it. (I’ll write more about it as the date gets closer.)
I haven’t told my husband about this yet because I know that he won’t be happy about this. I know that I made this promise and I broke it. At least I didn’t violate my marriage vows.
I have another reason to hit the ground running regarding doing art shows. I’m trying to get this art career further off the ground and it’s not easy given the current economic climate. I want to take as many opportunities to get my name out there as possible. It was bad enough that I got sidelined for a year-and-a-half because of a hip replacement and I’m still trying to make my way back in this society.
All of this frequent travelling this year has been totally disruptive. Every time I go out of town, I have to temporarily close down my Etsy store because I can’t bring my inventory and mailing supplies with me when I’m travelling long distances and I don’t have any hired employees who would run the store in my absense. (I haven’t made enough in revenue to justify hiring even a part-time helper.) Since January I’ve been out of town eight times and this upcoming trip will be the ninth one I’ve taken in 2010. For the record, I’ve been to the Tampa-St. Petersburg area of Florida in January, Phoenix in March, Phoenix again in May, a wedding anniversary weekend in Baltimore in early June, New York City in mid-June, Ocean City in early July, Connecticut in mid-July, and the Space Coast area of Florida in August.
Not only has my Etsy store suffered because I can’t spend as much time trying to promote it since I have to frequently close it but other areas of my life has suffered as well. I haven’t been able to visit my mother or other relatives on my side of the family as much as I wanted. I haven’t been around at my congregation as much either so I haven’t been seeing my friends there as much as I used to. I attempted to create an herbal garden this spring but I ended up neglecting it because of my frequent travels. (Some herb plants have survived the neglect while others are dead.) There are all sorts of intense time-consuming household chores I would like to focus on (such as organizing my arts and crafts supplies) that I’m not able to do because of all the traveling. On top of that, there were other arts and crafts show and/or exhibition opportunities that I had to turn down becaue they directly conflicted with my travels. (In fact, there was one such oppotunity scheduled for this weekend that I had to reluctantly turn down.)
I know that posting this on the Internet so my husband will eventually find it instead of telling him directly is a coward’s way out. But I’m just not in the mood to deal with any disputes since I’ve seen him getting stressed out over planning this East Coast memorial service for his mother while taking orders from his sister (who has basically assigned herself as The Chief Main Organizer of this service) via her numerous phone calls. I just didn’t want him to take out his frustrations about his sister on me since I know for sure he would do that if I told him in person (especially if I told him after he got off the phone from his sister’s many calls over the past few weeks).
Personally I would prefer to be home this weekend so I could work on my exhibit some more. The good news is that the bulk of the work can be done on the computer so I can at least take my laptop with me on this trip. I just won’t be able to do any printing or painting until after I return.
Sagittarius Dolly 
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