Close Encounters with God and Other Unbelieveable Things 1

Several months since the events that caused Austinites to turn out en masse for a non-music-related event, I think I can finally talk about it.

Several months ago the Texas Senate called an emergency session to finish discussion of the House Bill 2 that Senator Wendy Davis successfully filibustered.  The only item on the agenda was to pass the bill that would limit abortions in the State of Texas after twenty weeks (the point when they can reasonably feel pain), as well as raise the health standards of all clinics that offered abortions, while requiring that a doctor with local hospital privileges be on the premises during all abortions.

And the world turned it's eyes to Texas.  Living through the events I didn't realize how much people noticed.  In fact, I was surprised so many Texans noticed.  Along with a one friend, I went down to the Capital in my car, Bennie, to "protest" with my old purple rosary, the only clean blue shirt I could find, and greeting everyone I passed with a smile or a "good morning!"  There was no way anyone would have noticed me except for the fact that I was wearing an outlawed color on an outlawed day. 

Koishka, who drove down with me and aided me through the terror of finding a parking garage in Downtown Austin, laughed with me as we walked a few blocks to the Capital.  We passed one other person who was wearing blue and we waved a greeting.  She stopped us long enough to let us know that she had worn blue by mistake.  Koishka and I tried very hard not to laugh at the hilarity of her situation.  Imagine, how very embarrassing to show up in the enemy camp's color on a protest day!  Imagine if someone believed you.

Jovialities aside, I was really scared.  Koishka and I wandered around for probably half an hour before we found an older, retired couple, who were heading to the Cathedral to join a rosary walk to the Capital.  There we ran into more of our friends and at least in a group I felt a little more secure.  Once we got TO the Capital it was a different story.

Police and Texas Rangers carefully arranged for none of the opposing parties to interact.  Just the same I found out after the fact that the orange shirts (or those that opposed the Bill) were constantly being reprimanded for violence or threat of violence.  One news report stated that at least one had a jar of urine in her bag.

Blue shirts paraded quietly to the Capital while praying the rosary.  After that we joined together to sing Amazing Grace, the first verse, over and over and over again.  Then we calmly entered the Capital (and I was grateful I had left my purse) and then we continued singing in the big oval dome.  At several points I looked up to see video cameras inches from my face.  I tried my best not to change my expression but that was a bit unnerving.

Once we were in the dome I found another friend of mine who had brought her three small children, the oldest of whom was four and the youngest of whom was only a few months old.  Up until this point I hadn't been within twenty yards of the actual orange protest, but after we had been singing peacefully for several minutes, the orange shirts came up and began running around (and I do mean running and pushing and shoving) while screaming... something.  Someone pushed past and bumped into the four-year-old and Koishka and I positioned ourselves in front of the children, holding up signs with bluebonnets that someone had given us.  They kept pushing to the railing and Koishka and I traded off being in the front holding up the giant flower sign in order to keep anyone from running into the children.

Normally I would have been terrified, but not that morning.  For some strange reason, I had peace.  Around noon, Koishka and I departed from the rally and made our way back to Bennie.  Along the way, no one bothered us.  And all I thought was God is at work here.  

When I went into to work that day several people told me that they had seen me on the news and I cringed as I realized my Mother might find out.  So I went to the local news websites to see what they were reporting.  Several stations stated that the orange shirts outnumbered the blue shirts a hundred to one.  No one would believe that there were 2/3's orange and 1/3 blue shirts out there.  I was annoyed at the lack of accurate representation.  I was annoyed by the Bill itself because really, the Bill could have enveloped one or two of the points instead of all of them, and that would have been better than this endless circus.  I was annoyed that the orange shirts were being bused in but that the blue shirts were just coming on their spare mornings.  I was annoyed.

So my point today (and I swear it's coming shortly) is that it's voting day.  Get out and vote.  I'm not telling you who to vote for but pick a side and vote for it.  You can't backseat drive your life and then blame everyone else when you're going in circles.