Dinner Monday night I sit again with the NC contingent. Originally the keynote speaker that evening was Cecelia Muñoz, Director of the Domestic Policy Council at the White House, but she was unavailable due to the shutdown. The last minute guest speaker instead was Rev. Dr. William Barber, the President of the NC chapter of the NAACP. I suspect he was in town for the rally the next day. (I also don't think NC realizes how much we are in the national spotlight. I was asked multiple times over the two days "What's going on in North Carolina?!" People had heard about Moral Mondays and I was repeatedly asked to defend my lack of participation in them. I think a lot of people in NC keep their politics close to the vest out of fear of offending. I had never been asked before about my not attending. The Moral Mondays were supported by the NC Conference of the UMC and many of my colleagues participated, including our Bishop, who explicitly invited all of us to come to the final one in Raleigh. My problem was being overwhelmed by childcare logistics for my daughter who was less than a year old, ate dinner at 5 p.m., the start time, and was in bed by 7 p.m., the average end time. Anyway, there is a reason NC outnumbered other states and Methodists outnumbered other denominations at this summit - national attention is on us.)
Dr. Barber first invites a singer to lead us in a Moral Mondays' song - "Hold on... I know one thing we did wrong, we stayed in the darkness a little too long. I know one thing we did right, we started to fight for immigrant rights. Hold on..." One of the first things Dr. Barber mentions is the Doonesbury comic strip from the Sunday newspaper the day before, which is titled "Spotlight on North Carolina" (http://doonesbury.slate.com/strip/archive/2013/10/06). I also learn that Dr. Barber and I had the same preaching professor at Duke Divinity School, Dr. William Turner, although a couple decades apart. Here are the other things I jot down:
"Even if the original writers [of the Declaration of Independence] were all male, even if they didn't mean it, they shouldn't have put it on paper... all men are created equal and they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights..."
"It is just mean to not let people share in what they help build."
"Why did we allow 'welfare' to become a dirty word?"
"Texts and emails aren't going to get this done. We must follow Jesus to the cross."
"The time is now to stand, not as Democrat or Republican, but as prophets who say: 'Remember!'"
Citing Romans where Paul talks about showing love for the alien (which is the King James translation of 'stranger'), treat them as brother and sister, treat everyone right in the law and in Christ.
"However they got here, show them God's love."
Afterward, the NC group is gathered for a picture with Dr. Barber. I end up right next to him in the picture and that is when I decide my District Superintendent needs to know what I'm up to. In case this picture circulates (although I haven't seen a copy of it yet), my supervisor ought to know what's going on. So later that night I friend her on Facebook :) That night is also the first time I get an inkling that Tuesday's rally won't just be a rally but will involve something more. There is a reason that I comment on Facebook that I feel like a rebel. I am flippant about it for my friends who disapprove while also wanting to continue to post about my trip.
Anyway, I walk back to the hostel with the Ferrum College crowd, who then go on to a restaurant to debrief and invite me along, but I am too exhausted and so I go to bed and sleep well that night.
In the morning I join a group leaving the hostel and we take the Metro together to Union Station, where we split up for breakfast. I find Coke Zero and Auntie Anne's pretzel bites, the breakfast of champions, I know, but at least I'll be awake and not hungry. As we reunite, one member of the group finds herself at the same table as a reporter from The Washington Post. They start by talking about what one of them is reading and then the reporter learns we're all there for the rally on immigration reform that day. One member of our group is a DREAMer and the reporter interviews her before we walk over to Capitol Hill. (I've looked but never been able to find this interview online.)
Tuesday is much more chaotic, largely due to the government shutdown. The original plan was to attend meetings with our corresponding Representatives, meetings which were already arranged, and attend a rally on the Mall afterward. However, due to the shutdown, some Representatives cancel their meetings. On Monday we were supposed to meet with our small group to prepare for these meetings. In my assigned group of four to meet with a representative of Congressman Price, there are one person I never met (she probably didn't attend the summit at all), one person I met once (she was part of the Church World Service group from Greensboro) but I never find her again, and the fourth person is the husband of my colleague Edith.
We all gather at the Methodist Building at 9 a.m. The Methodist Building is the only non-government building on Capitol Hill and it's been there since the 1920's when the United Methodist Women bought the land and put up the building. We drop off our luggage in a big room and pick up updates for those whose meetings have changed (there is nothing on mine). I check in on Facebook, because it's pretty cool to be there. We are sorted by the color dots on our name tags, except mine and a few others have no dots. We're told to go with any group we want. I join Edith. We're getting ready for the prayer service when I hear my name called out and I turn and see an old friend I haven't seen in ten years. Jo Ann works at the Methodist Building and saw my Facebook post. She takes me out of the crowd and up to her office and we chat and catch up for quite a while. When she needs to get back to work, I go back downstairs and walk around the Capitol til I find the press conference, which was to follow the prayer service. I try to find a good spot to be able to hear, but I can't. I do find Edith and her family.
Next, a large group of us from the press conference walk over to Speaker Boehner's office. We're led around to a side entrance and go through security. The organizers direct us down the hallway to the elevators. As we get off the elevators an organizer from the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society is next to direct us - only since he knows me, he asks me to take his spot directing people until everyone finishes coming up and I find myself now giving directions in a building I only just entered for the first time ten minutes ago. Since I wait for the stragglers, I am at the back of the crowd outside Speaker Boehner's office and I can't hear anything, except Bishop Carcaño's prayer, it's quiet then. Apparently what happened was that Edith shared her story with a representative from the Speaker's office and Edith told me afterward that he looked like he really didn't care. (Here's an article from Church World Service about it: http://www.cwsglobal.org/newsroom/news-releases/faith-leaders-kick-off-day-of-action.html) I find Edith and her family as we go back down the hallway and elevator, retracing our steps. We eat lunch together back at Union Station.
I'm then ready to go meet with the representative of my Representative and prepared to go alone, but Edith insists they delay their drive home to NC and her husband comes with me. He and I arrive ten minutes early at Congressman Price's office and after a wait we're informed that members of our group already met with Justin, the representative, because he couldn't keep the original appointment time and could only meet earlier. I am really frustrated and confused and wonder why I'd bothered and why I hadn't been contacted. Edith and her family leave to go home. I wander down the Mall to the rally wondering if the cost of this whole trip has been worth it. The airplane snafu, being gone the longest so far from my one year old, making the rest of my week hectic to make up for being gone these two days. Why was I there? I certainly didn't feel needed.
As I wander down the Mall I run into one of the organizers, the one who invited me to come, actually. She turns around and we walk together to the rally. She shares that the logistics for this summit had been an absolute nightmare because they had tried to get key people here from key states, and then combined with the shutdown, which couldn't have been predicted, made for the disorganization of Tuesday. We pick up a poster for me just as one of the bands starts to play, meaning I'd missed all the speakers, including Congresswoman Pelosi. Mostly the rally is just families hanging out and groups in matching t-shirts who'd organized to attend. As we walk back to the Methodist Building we run into a couple ladies who want to know if we know anything about the "CD" (civil disobedience) and I wonder what world I've stumbled into. There's speculation about what the CD will entail and a comment about a friend who's napping because he expects to be spending the night picking people up from jail when they're released after being arrested for CD. (Turned out about 200 people were arrested for civil disobedience, including 8 lawmakers, which simply consisted of refusing to leave the middle of the street. Here's the news article: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/10/08/3265366/lawmakers-arrested-as-thousands.html)
Back at the Methodist Building in the big room I share with the organizers hanging out there about the mix-up with my meeting. One of the organizers tells me that she'd tried to call me about the changed time and that she had gone to it herself. What? My cell phone registered one missed call at noon from an unknown number with no voicemail. That turned out to be her, but noon was when the meeting was! And she wasn't from NC - why'd she go to my meeting?
I check in one more time with Jo Ann, take her up on her offer of coffee, and then head for the airport. I buy a fiction novel because I need something else to read. The real world has gotten real enough, this trip was more than I bargained for, both in terms of the cost and the content. Sharing immigration stories and networking I'm familiar with; hearing folks share their story didn't really impact me, since I know a dozen similar stories. The disorganization of Tuesday, things not going according to schedule, the looser structure, the lack of a final get-together at the end to wrap it all up, and talking with folks so familiar with "CD" that it has its own lingo were outside my comfort zone.
Overall, I'm glad I went. It's good to be pushed outside your comfort zone every now and then. I love Washington, D.C. It was great to see Jo Ann! And the General Board of Church and Society is working with Edith, myself, and others to plan a follow-up event here in North Carolina next year. We are a key state in the immigration battle, whether we like it or not.
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