The Women's March

from the Denver Post

Two weeks ago yesterday people all over the country took to the streets. Denver's 2018 Women's March was more than 50,000 strong and I was one of them.

Last year I couldn't participate, because I was between knee surgeries. This year I could and did. My friend Lou and I caught the light rail at Federal Station, the second to western most stop on the  line. Waiting at the station were people of all ages and genders. A good number of marchers were already on the train. As we got closer to Denver the train filled nicely. My daughter Grace and her fiance Bob joined us at the Sheridan station. Along with many others on the train, Grace and Bob wore pink pussy hats. (Well, technically Bob's was a Pokemon hat, but it was pink with ears. Close enough.)

We stopped for breakfast, then took one of the 16th Street Mall buses to Civic Center Park. The Regional Transit District added cars to all the light rail lines and were running extra buses on 16th Street Mall.

Even so, the buses were packed. There were a few people on the bus who were trying to get to work. You should have seen all the jockying around and stepping off and back on to let them out. (Reminded me of those videos of the Japanese trains where uniformed transportation folk push and shove, packing riders into the train.)

Luckily Lou and I were able to get seats. It was a good thing, too. Even with our new knees the milling around in the park before the walk and then the walk were tough tests of our endurance.

         

                                   Grace and Bob had hats              I didn't, so I wore pink hair!

Early in the week, the weather forecast for The March was, cold and cloudy with snow flurries. By the day before The March, the local meteorologists were promising sunshine and no snow until after dark. It was still pretty chilly, so most everybody was layered up.

We got to Civic Center Park early. As you can see,

we had bluebird skies.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere a sign!

Some determined

   

            Several men and children carried these           And a bit of a tribute to Teddy Roosevelt.
             with their arrows pointing to all of us.

There were signs supporting a grand variety of Civil Rights Issues -- "Women's Rights are Civil Rights," "Girls just want to have fun-damental rights," "Black Lives Matter." Signs supporting DACA. Rainbows to include the LGBTQ members of our community. My favorite was "This is what Trans looks like" (carried by a very tall trans woman.)

 Many were anti-'rump and quite witty.    

   

                                   
 

Some of the anti-Groper-in-Chief signs were in (shall we say) questionable taste and I didn't take pictures of them. There was one I wish I had. It said "Grab him by the mid-terms." And to that end there were people everywhere registering people to vote, though I think that most of us there, who were qualified to vote, were already registered.

There were so many people in the park that once it started, it took us more than an hour to get to the ACTUAL starting line. Grace described The March as more of a Shuffle. Between the sun and all that body heat we were coming out of our jackets.

The ACTUAL starting line.

By then Lou and I were about tuckered out, so we peeled off and headed back toward 16th Street Mall and somewhere for lunch.

All the eating places from sidewalk to upscale indoors dining were crowded with pink hats and signs!

There was no way to get on a bus to make our way back to the light rail. Too crowded. Sooooo, we walked  -- 22 more blocks, to be exact.

Next year, we're not going to wait in the park for The Women's March to begin. We are going directly to the ACTUAL starting line. And you can bet we're going to vote this fall.

Y and Z -- thus endeth the 2017 A to Z April Blogging Challenge

 My daughter says I am the most anti-authoritarian person she knows. And she could be right, though of course I don't know everyone she knows nor do I know their standing on the conformity/rebellion continuum.

The unlikelihood that I will read written instructions, my standard noncompliance to verbal commands, and my uncommon reactions to people with celebrity status may be evidence for her thinking that.

These two common traffic signs are excellent examples. 

The No Left Turn sign causes me to exercise the most stringent self-control. It seems my car's steering wheel almost turns left of its own accord whether I have any reason to turn left or not.  

 And the No Parking. It goes without saying that I invariably apply the brakes even though there's nothing that interests me within walking distance of the sign. 

This could explain why I have run out of the inspiration to follow the rules for the 2017 A to Z April Blogging Challenge and have generally messed up this last week. 

To be fair, though, I don't really agree with our English alphabet's order. I mean little things like "U, V, W." Now, if you'll compare that with the Spanish alphabet, you'll see that it's out of order. In English, the Spanish V is pronounced "vay" and the W which is obviously the V doubled is pronounced "dobla-vay." So why would we separate the "yoo" from "double-yoo" which looks like a "double-vee" with the single "vee?"

Then there's the geography of the United States -- Why in the world is Indiana east of Illinois? Ahhh, but that's a whole 'nother question.

There are traffic signs that I do pay attention to like these. I live at the foot of the foothills to the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains and when I'm driving in the mountains these signs mean slow down, gear down, and prepare for your heart to constrict in fear.

           

And when we're in Rocky Mountain National Park this is my favorite sign. 

Actually it means "slow down," too. But for an altogether different reason. It means the cars ahead of you will all be stopped and the people will be out of their cars taking pictures. -- Me, too. See, sometimes I conform.

And if you see this sign, it probably means you've taken a
wrong turn and ended up in Dallas, Texas.

Although there are no hills that look like this near Dallas.
But there are lots of nice folks and they will gladly give you directions if you get lost -- speaking from personal experience.



What? No Y or Z topic? Oh, well. Maybe I'll do better at conforming to the recommended letters for the daily blog next year. In the meantime I'll be visiting some of your wonderful blogs that I've become aware of because of this year's A to Z.

Enjoy the rest of this blogging year and write on.

    

#atozchallenge

Signs, Signs -- a rant

Bachelor Elk Herd and tourists July 29, 2015

Sorry, y'all, but this post is a rant. See this glorious view of the Front Range Mountains. My daughter Grace took this picture from the car window as we drove easterly on Trail Ridge Road through Rocky Mountain National Park. As you can see there is a group of elk taking their leisure in the high mountain sunshine and an even larger group of humans endangering themselves, their children, and the fragile tundra plant life to get close to these wild animals. Wild animals, I might add, with full-grown antlers that they very well know how to use.

Signs all along the highway remind people to park only in designated areas. With a rise of more than 4,000 feet to its 12,183 foot high point, its many hair-pin curves, and its abundant unfenced wildlife, the highway is dangerous enough without cars parked hither and yon and people wondering back and forth willy-nilly across it. How can a traveler enjoy the grand vistas while they're worried about running over somebody's poorly supervised four-year-old? Or maybe running over that thoughtless somebody?

The signs warn against approaching wildlife. It's exciting to see marmots and chipmunks and pika and mountain goats and big horned sheep and elk and mountain lions and bear. But even the little critters bite. The big ones can do you much more harm. And if they do, they can be, and too often are, killed by the authorities.

The signs advise people to stay on the trails. Above tree-line the ground is not barren. It is covered with beautiful and fragile alpine tundra plants. Now these plants are amazing survivors. They must tolerate extreme weather conditions. They've evolved to survive grazing and trampling by the native animal population. They haven't had time to adapt to the more than three million humans who visit from June through October which is when the highway is clear of snow enough for human travel and the earth is clear enough for these plants' growing season.

These signs are not posted for their artistic qualities nor to provide practice for an apparently reading-challenged tourist population. These signs are to protect lives -- of the tourists, the other animals, and the plants.