When a crowd that’s supposed to be 200,000 grows to 500,000 systems are strained to the breaking point, and that was my experience trying to get people together for a meet up.
”The Best Day of My Life”
That was my husband’s response, and it didn’t even bother me that our wedding day had been superceded by this! It’s hard to distill the experience into a nice summary. Here are some of the highlights:
- Singing and dancing to “Express Yourself” along with Madonna and 500,000 new friends.
- Chanting “We won’t go away! Welcome to your first day!” as close as we could get to the White House.
- Hearing that the crowd estimate was more than 500,000 people and chanting “We trumped Trump!”
- Marching by the African American Museum and feeling grateful that this was finished and opened while Obama was still in office.
- Using the portapotties that had been set up for the Inauguration and seeing how many were in near-pristine condition.
- Sharing tweets of the aerial photos of the crowd with the women around me — especially the ones that compared it to the crowd the day before.
- Hearing an incredible speech from Ashley Judd to all the nasty women (and men) in the crowd. Seriously, this woman needs to run for office:
- Sharing pictures and crowd estimates from sister marches around the country and around the world.
Were You There, Too?
Please share your stories in the comments below. If you tried to meet up with us, I apologize for not getting us together earlier so that we would have been easier to find and you would not have been caught in the transit crush.
A Massive Contrast from the Inauguration Crowd
My husband, sister-in-law and I were there for the Inauguration protests along the parade route the day before. The picture I took at 11:30 a.m. is on the right.
I suspect that every Trump supporter was near the Congress end of The Mall at this point. Someone I met today said that there were tickets available for the taking at the entrances.
But the bleacher seats across the street from this view (on the Mall side of Pennsylvania Avenue) never filled. On my side, the barricades were lined maybe 1 — 2 people deep.
But here is the thing that really bothered me: after Trump passed by, but before almost all of the bands and every high school or college band passed by, the Trump supporters started streaming out. They didn’t care about seeing anyone else in the parade. Yes, it was cold and rainy — but we were all well-dressed for the weather. So the kids marched in front of barricades and bleachers that were even emptier.
Some Lessons Learned For Next Time
Simply put — we needed to meet much earlier, before the transit systems got overloaded. If we’d met 1.5 hours earlier, people would have started early enough to miss the crush and we would have been easier to find at the meeting site.
Successful groups did just that — they met early where they could get coffee or breakfast and hang out together before it was time to leave. Then they left for the march earlier so they got closer to the front.
I received text after text from people who intended to join us, but couldn’t get there or couldn’t find us when they did.
But the intrepid crew above in the header, with Kossacks eeff, RevKate, gizmo59 and his husband, my husband and sister-in-law, came together to march together. I was taking the picture. They made a wonderful day just that much better (and supplied the pink pussy hats!)
It Means Nothing if Marching Is Everything
Detractors here and elsewhere discounted the importance of this day. I disagree with that, strongly. After the November election, we needed this day to remind us that we are strong, that we are many and that we are not going away.
Speakers emphasized over and over again that marching was not enough, and I also agree strongly with that. We can’t pretend that the March, in and of itself, will save the ACA, prevent further voter suppression or rein in Trump’s excesses.
We have too much to do to retire those pink hats. Instead, we can wear them to town halls and ribbon cutting ceremonies and our congresspeoples’ offices. We can wear them as we place our calls. We can use them to help us gather people at organizational meetings for #Indivisible groups.
History had its eyes on us today — and we represented.