Why I Marched

You may have noticed that I skipped a post last Friday. That happened for several reasons:

1. It was my birthday.
2. It was also inauguration day.
3. As a friend put it in a Facebook birthday post, “That is just so not fair.”

I spent the whole day moping around and feeling dejected.  And that’s exactly why, on Saturday, I marched.

Trust me when I say that the easiest thing in the world would have been to skip the Women’s March on Austin, one of the many sister marches that took place in conjunction with the Women’s March on Washington. There is nothing I cherish more than quiet time. After a long week of work–commuting in city traffic, then leading classes, holding office hours, working with colleagues on various projects–this introvert’s soul is beaten up.

But I just couldn’t stay home. Mike and I had planned to attend the march for weeks. He was no more excited about leaving the house than I was, but we both believed it was important. So we put on our walking shoes and made the hour-long drive to Austin.

And I’m really, really glad we did.

We parked about two miles from the statehouse and were accompanied by fellow marchers during our entire walk downtown. Our numbers grew larger the closer we got. Some people were carrying signs; others were empty-handed. Some women were wearing bright pink pussy hats. I actually saw some women wearing shoes with heels I’d never even attempt, much less march in. Some wore workout clothes, and others wore maxi dresses.

A few were in wheelchairs; others were in strollers.  Before we even got to the march I had a pretty clear sense of the diversity of the crowd. I heard people comment on that throughout the day.

We arrived just as the march was starting, and march volunteers told us to fill in from the edges rather than waiting to join the end of the line (which, as it happened, wouldn’t appear for another hour or more.) Right from the start, I was stunned by how well-mannered the marchers were. The Austin Police Department later published an estimate of 50,000 people participating, though the crowd felt even larger. And yet, I never heard a single derogatory word.

 

 

 

In fact, I didn’t even see anyone get angry with anyone else. I saw exactly the opposite.

We chanted. We cheered. At one point, a woman tripped over a rough patch of asphalt and half a dozen people ran to her aid–helping her up, grabbing the sign she’d dropped before it could get trampled, offering her a water bottle. (It was unusually hot and sunny for a January day, even in Austin.)

I saw an elderly woman in a wheelchair hand the rose she’d been carrying to a little boy in a stroller, stroke his hair, and say something I couldn’t hear–but it made him smile, and it made his parents thank her.

People actually said excuse me when they bumped into each other–which was nearly impossible to avoid in a crowd of that size.

I had worried that the march might get out of hand, but not too much. It was Austin, after all. I really believed anyone who opposed the march would just stay home–or roll their eyes at the protesters as we marched past their sidewalk lunch tables. That was pretty much what happened, as far as I could tell. By the time we’d finished the march route, we could see that large numbers of people were just getting started. The march had lapped itself, and it was still going strong.

Someone–a friend of a friend, someone I don’t know in real life– posted on Facebook, later in the day, that she thought protesting didn’t accomplish anything other than “letting a bunch of people know they all share the same opinion.” (I’m paraphrasing her words there, not quoting exactly.) Truth be told, that’s part of why I marched. Mike and I wanted to know we weren’t alone in our anger–and we saw that we most certainly are not. We also saw that there are literally thousands of good people around us in a world that seems to have lost its bearings.

 

But Mike and I try really hard to be people who walk the walk, not just talk the talk. This was a chance to do that in a very literal way. When things get really bad, as they are now, I feel the need to do something. It’s not always easy to know what. This was an easy thing we could do–if you call walking 5 miles easy. (As I mentioned, we parked quite a way from the statehouse. The march route itself was about 1.5 miles long.) We had friends who couldn’t march, for various reasons, and this felt like a chance for us to stand up for everyone and everything we care about.

It’s insulting when anyone claims that protesting means nothing, that what really matters is writing or calling your representatives or something else. I do those things as well. And I don’t shop at stores that treat their employees badly, even if they offer the lowest price for an item I want. And I contact the companies I do support and tell them why I’m voting for them with my dollars. And I donate money to non-profit organizations that support my values. I often wonder if the people who oppose protests can say the same.

Anyone who assumes that those protesters aren’t really concerned about the issues–that they’re just having a street party with thousands of their closest friends–is jumping to conclusions that say more about them than me.

Someday in the not-too-distant future, when my grandchildren ask me what I did to stop this man from destroying civilization, I’ll be able to say “Everything I could.” And I’ll be telling them the truth.

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