To Love my country's Declaration of Freedoms
July 4 2022
The first Port Angeles Wa parade since 2020 lockdown mandate was smaller and very few floats. Even the large, loaded logging trucks were missing. I remembered at the 2019 parade shouting out, " lets morn the trees." Logging a main source of industry, employment and shipping to the orient countries for Port Angeles. It was not appreciated. Wrinkled foreheads told it all.
This year was very intimate and full of children lining the streets with their family groups. Camp chairs and coolers of drinks lined the sidewalk below my window. The elements were there with marching band and music from floats along with candy flying through the air.
Celebrating our country's birthday along with the evening fireworks reminds me of the battles to
declare our freedom from the tyranny and taxation with no representation in England.
No representation is the main issue and taxation with no voice, no vote. With voting scheduled in the fall, I pray all those who are in need of safe abortion healthcare will be heard and supported by the majority by voting. Now we are experiencing a minority imposing religious beliefs over healthcare for the poor. A heated issue and rightly so. For me our voting process needs reform. We are 50 states and many territories with population concentrations now dictating. Currently Midwest over west and east coast with larger population centers. Major legislation affecting ALL women needs to be voted on a national level.. Not by the states separately...noting the states now banning abortion have the larger poor populations in need of care and equal access to healthcare.
Teaching: to vote and not become discouraged. As a country we are 246 yrs old and have yet to accomplish what the Declaration of independence says as written:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Note: women have only been included since 1926, and Black voters provided enforcement of the Rights to vote in the 1960's.
We are in a process to become all we have written as laws, and we must vote to keep our government representatives from abusing their power. At any time politicians can ignore enforcement of these laws..so the strong discrimination of Blacks was dismissed by the prevailing attitudes in a part of this large land. Equally women faced being treated as " unequal". I consider this country is only 50 years into a full voting representation. Now is the time after two presidential elections ignored the popular votes over electoral ones! Reform the electoral college in this age of technology is necessary and NOT relying on horseback transportation to cast votes
in the 1800's our norm!
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Footnote
Active gunman event during a parade in Highland Park Illinois. Seven dead including children.
Voting has not
resulted in gun control legislation over the last 30 years of mass shootings.....How can this happen?
money and gun lobbyists have VOTED without our representation......and almost anyone can buy a lethal weapon and not to defend from overtake by another country as the Bill of Rights amendment stresses, so as not to be colonized again, but to mass murder of children by children?.......
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July 11 2022
July 11 2022
This late Sunday morning I find the shop owner is watering the doorway flower tubs. The Alley Cat boutique is painted in a pale pink. It borders the alley I walk to the lot where my car is parked. It has whimsical women's clothing, much like the ones I would have passed by while living in the "Haight Ashbury Street" neighborhood in the 70's. I made extra money-making clothing for sale in a consignment shop. Jean skirts were my specialty. Sewn from recycled jeans and sewn on a treadle sewing machine. It is quite impossible for me to not reference my past experiences.
Especially the creative ones and sharing them with others. My quilted part of the skirt was usually of mountains, oceans, and trees. Not city life, but where my heart was longing to be.
I have yet to go in. My sizes are usually not found in boutiques of this kind. Yet I fancy this woman has her story to tell me and it would be nice to see how she finds her stores treasures.
Teaching: For me to find a common ground and reach out more in my neighborhood. We all have more in common than differences. The pandemic for me was a time to live in a mood of mistrust and a need to just survive. Time to thrive again.
July 11 2022
I could no longer wait to drive out to the point on the 3-mile spit that surrounds the coastline of Port Angeles. I drove out to the end that houses the Coast Guard Station. It is visible from my studio window and look back from across the water. In the photo I aimed it to be right above the stump to find it easily in the photo.
My apartment is in a historic building former Hotel Lee Plaza. It is the tallest building in town and easy to see from this distance. Saved from destruction 20 years age it now houses apartments for low income and disabled.
I has been two years since I took my small convertible smart Car for a drive to my favorite spot in Port Angeles. Early morning brings only a few residents and visitors out to walk, run and walk their pups.Meditation on the spot directly across from my apartment brings me a sense of belonging. A sense of "place" I have not felt since moving here a few months before Pandemic lockdown.
Teaching: Remember to give myself the opportunity to see from as many angles, views and locations. My apartment is not the only safe place to explore. I am ok., I made it through the worst of it.
Hopefully.
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