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Working voter registration at Walmart (only reason I'd ever go there) as my 9/11 memorial. It's amazing how many people do not want to register. One woman said:"One crook out, another crook in--why bother?" Hard to argue...
And yet I still see this presidential election as being a referendum on the war and think maybe it might make a tiny difference. But they may be right.
It was interesting to see how many young black men did want to register. I guess they know who'll be fighting if the war goes on.
ETA: As we ate dinner on the deck with candles under the lush leaves, listening to the symphony of cicadas, tree frogs, crickets, and the helicopters flying over the nearby football game, I thought about the past. Forty years ago, I worked on registering black voters in SC. A very different experience. Everyone was afraid--the potential registrees, the people like me who went door to door to locate them, and the sworn-in registrar who followed us.
The neighborhoods we went in were visited only by white people if they wanted to rip off the inhabitants in some way--rent, burial insurance, debt collections, arrest warrants. It took a lot of courage for those folks just to talk to us. I remember one neighborhood just off a main thoroughfare that's US 1 through this city--it's down in a valley, with a creek that in those days probably doubled as open sewer. The house were wooden boxes set on stacks of cinderblocks, with no insulation or central heat, and barely having indoor plumbing. We all knew that there were plenty of people in the city and the state who would really do us harm if they knew what we were doing. And I could leave, but the people we registered were stuck here with whatever consequences came.
And yet with amazing dignity and bravery, they registered. And now my US Rep is black. And I can stand up in front of a busy store and casually ask person after person if they're registered, and there's no fear at all for any of us.
Just the problem of the vote not meaning anything, possibly.
Or else, maybe things get just a tiny bit better, sometimes. I hope.
19 Lin: Approach
The judgement
APPROACH has supreme success.
Perseverance furthers.
When the eighth month comes,
There will be misfortune.
The hexagram as a whole points to a time of joyous, hopeful progress. Spring is approaching. Joy and forbearance bring high and low nearer together. Success is certain. But we must work with determination and perseverance to make full use of the propitiousness of the time. And on thing more: spring does not last forever. In the eighth month the aspects are reversed. Then only two strong, light lines are left; these do not advance but are in retreat (see next hexagram). We must take heed of this change in good time. If we meet evil before it becomes reality- before it has even begun to stir-we can master it.
So I see this now as related to political activity. And hoping that this is a time of advancement. But well aware that it may not be.
And yet I still see this presidential election as being a referendum on the war and think maybe it might make a tiny difference. But they may be right.
It was interesting to see how many young black men did want to register. I guess they know who'll be fighting if the war goes on.
ETA: As we ate dinner on the deck with candles under the lush leaves, listening to the symphony of cicadas, tree frogs, crickets, and the helicopters flying over the nearby football game, I thought about the past. Forty years ago, I worked on registering black voters in SC. A very different experience. Everyone was afraid--the potential registrees, the people like me who went door to door to locate them, and the sworn-in registrar who followed us.
The neighborhoods we went in were visited only by white people if they wanted to rip off the inhabitants in some way--rent, burial insurance, debt collections, arrest warrants. It took a lot of courage for those folks just to talk to us. I remember one neighborhood just off a main thoroughfare that's US 1 through this city--it's down in a valley, with a creek that in those days probably doubled as open sewer. The house were wooden boxes set on stacks of cinderblocks, with no insulation or central heat, and barely having indoor plumbing. We all knew that there were plenty of people in the city and the state who would really do us harm if they knew what we were doing. And I could leave, but the people we registered were stuck here with whatever consequences came.
And yet with amazing dignity and bravery, they registered. And now my US Rep is black. And I can stand up in front of a busy store and casually ask person after person if they're registered, and there's no fear at all for any of us.
Just the problem of the vote not meaning anything, possibly.
Or else, maybe things get just a tiny bit better, sometimes. I hope.
19 Lin: Approach
The judgement
APPROACH has supreme success.
Perseverance furthers.
When the eighth month comes,
There will be misfortune.
The hexagram as a whole points to a time of joyous, hopeful progress. Spring is approaching. Joy and forbearance bring high and low nearer together. Success is certain. But we must work with determination and perseverance to make full use of the propitiousness of the time. And on thing more: spring does not last forever. In the eighth month the aspects are reversed. Then only two strong, light lines are left; these do not advance but are in retreat (see next hexagram). We must take heed of this change in good time. If we meet evil before it becomes reality- before it has even begun to stir-we can master it.
So I see this now as related to political activity. And hoping that this is a time of advancement. But well aware that it may not be.
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