Peace, Love and Gate Crashers

I have this friend named Dana.  What she says is so amazing, that my daughter, who knows a good wordsmith when she sees one, says that I should start another blog called, “Shit Dana Says”.  I agree. It would be brilliant, but I can’t follow her around with a pencil and a piece of paper and then it would be fake anyway. I just have to take the moments as they naturally occur and zzzziiing!  I know “Shit Dana Says” when I hear it. She nails the situation in words that no person has ever strung together in a sentence before. So, hold that thought.

Being across the river from our nation’s capital, I feared the worst from 10,000 trucks inundating the roads, rendering movement from one place to another, impossible on the weekend of my son’s wedding.  One Dude on the news promised me that there would be millions of people taking part…the biggest thing, etc, etc, etc,. But the only report of trucks that I heard, was on Sunday when one of the groomsmen rode his bike back from St. John’s Episcopal Church on Lafayette Square where he works and yes, that is The  President’s Church. Any president. Pick one. They all worship there because they can walk from the White House. The secret service alerts the church sexton about 4am, they come in and sweep the place and prepare it for the President to sit in the “President’s Pew”.  My son once told me the story of his fellow seminarian delivering his very first sermon in his entire life and there sat the President of the United States. No pressure. Just be yourself. Anyway, the groomsman said there were four trucks sitting in front of the White House blowing their horns. FOUR! Uno! Dos! Tres! Quatro!! That was hardly worth my pre-wedding meltdown. But it was bound to be caused by something, so I will take a fake, non-existent protest any day of the week.

So while very angry people were storming the Memorials in DC all weekend, (on foot, thank God!) some of the wedding guests who had brought their young daughter with them, took her to see democracy in action on the morning of the wedding. She had to write a paper about it, because she had missed a day of school and this was her penitence assigned by the teacher. They walked around and the little girl saw the stormed gates stacked up at the WWII memorial where people had defied the government and made their statement while waving flags and signs and yelled things that were not very nice.

I love a good protest as much as the next person and I do love this country!!  Dana can say all the shit she says and nobody goes to jail. Ain’t America great!!!!

The wedding guests/DC visitors noticed one memorial where nothing was stacked, no one was screaming, there were no vitriolic words on paper, no flags, and no one had even tried to storm the gates. They lifted their daughter over the gate, climbed over themselves and read all of the amazing quotes around the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial. The little girl skipped from one wall to another, learning about all of the things he had to say about his love for humanity, non-violence and peace.

That sums up the wedding weekend. While the world outside the seminary walls may have been filled with hate and dysfunction, inside there was nothing but love for humanity, love for the happy couple and just love in general.

At the wedding reception, my friend Dana leaned over to me and said, “Rhonda, I am here to tell you that there is no amount of money in the world that could buy what we have here in this place tonight!”, with her usual dramatic flair and a fake pound on the table.

“Wow, Dana! I think that’s the nicest shit you’ve ever said!” As usual. She nailed it.

By the way…is it just me, or was Sarah Palin wearing hair extensions?

We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long,but it bends toward justice- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Shit people write!!!!