I have been having the most ridiculous dreams lately.
Thanks, 'Rona.
Last night, I had a dream that a dear friend of mine asked me to emcee/host/appear at an event for the National Park Service to raise funds for a new NATIONAL MONUMENT TO THE FIRST AMENDMENT...
If you go and read it, that's the right to freedom from and of a national religion, free speech, a free press... and the right to protest.
In my mind, I saw a render of what the monument would look like, along the National Mall, near the MLK Monument and the Smithsonian's African American History Museum. The monument wasn't huge, but it was powerful. There were statues - I'd say about 100 or so, facing a giant white oblesk-wall.... and the statues were in a multitude of colors and representing the history of the people of our country in all areas, of all races, creeds and color. They were colonial-era clad figures up front, which represented the revolutionary war-era protestors who brought about the birth of our country. There was one for Benjamin Edes of Boston. If you don't know who he is, Google him. Big figure in birth of of a free press.
As I looked at the figures carved out of marble... and in the rows which made their way back in an almost perfect square, there were people of all races, creeds, colors, representing the different times of protest in strife in our Nation. One figure of Lincoln stood in a row reflective of the Civil War era. 1700's. 1800's. 1900's. Current-era protesters. From across the pages of our history, including the not-so-pleasant-parts of our history, these faceless yet male and female human forms in stone stood facing the great stone wall in front of them. Men and women. In hues of white stone and onyx, brown, yellow, and even rainbow-looking bismuth-crystal figures stood. Some with signs. Some with fists raises. Some on their knees with both hands up. Some taking a knee. One group of three or four who looked like they were being blasted with high-pressure water from a hose. Others handcuffed on their knees, heads lowered.
One laying prone, face down on the ground, who looked like they'd been choked out after having a knee on the neck.
All of them facing in the direction of that wall, in white stone. A slab rising to cast an almost hour-glass like shadow on those in front of it.
On the face of that stone wall... that slab... you read the names of people and events who inspired moments of national protest... in American history. From all sides. For and against. I read "NO JUSTICE NO PEACE." I read the words "COLUMBINE." I saw the student figures in stone who were gazing at the reference to the MSD School Shooting. I saw the multi-colored figures looking at the words PULSE NIGHT CLUB and ORLANDO.
In the middle of this word cloud in stone on a wall, were the words of our Constitution's First Amendment.
The one thing which made all of this seem real to me, in this dream, was that in the rectangle of stone protest figures facing this wall with words... was a path. Probably one to two persons wide. It was an aisle which walked into the middle of this rectangle of stone figures to represent American citizens in protest. That aisle ended in a small, circular area where three or four... or maybe a family or friends could stand in the middle of the figures around them.
Around the circle? Carved figures of MLK and LINCOLN. HAMILTON and ROSA PARKS. GEORGE FLOYD and ALICE PAUL. SUSAN B ANTHONY.... Of reporters and TV camera crews - with cameras from across history... doing what they do, some facing the protest-figure statues as if they were taking photos or reporting on what they were doing.
I didn't get to see too many more, but I got the idea.
I woke up not too long after that. And as I laid in my bed, listening to my accidentally-un-set alarm chirping at me to wake up, I thought about that dream...
We are meant to walk into the center of the circle. To be in the middle of this protest.... to have a moment among the moments of protest which have defined who we are. Around the protest figures in stone, holding signs and megaphones... we would stand... hopefully... to understand that the future of this amazing, beautiful right...
... is us. And it's future... depends on what WE... are going to do with it.
Crazy, right? I know. These COVID-DREAMS have been crazy lately... especially when you think that DC just painted the greatest monument to protest, free speech and more along 16th Street in DC...
Anyway... it was just a dream. But, what a beautiful monument it would be.
I have been having the most ridiculous dreams lately.
Thanks, 'Rona.