The Morning After: The Dream

Today is the anniversary of Martin Luther King's Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech.

It's a sad irony (How many times have I used this phrase in the past three years?) that it comes the day after what seemed like a bad drug trip that lasted four nights.  I'm talking about the Republican National Convention, which featured more gaslighting than Angela Lansbury's first film.* Dreaming--more precisely, exhorting your audience to envision and follow your dream--is an invitation to a journey toward a better place.  What happened at the convention is the exact opposite:  Speakers imputed sinister motives, words and actions to their enemies and hellish conditions to places that had been doing well (or, at least, improving) until the COVID-19 epidemic.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised at the tone of the convention, given that Trump has not only vowed not to ride a bike, but has jeered cyclists.  On the other hand, MLK was known to take a spin.  And, like Einstein, he looked so happy in the saddle!

*--Like many people, I thought Gaslight was a Hitchcock film until I saw it.  George Cukor, in fact, directed it.

The Real Way To Promote Peace

Although his actual birthday was the 15th, Martin Luther King Jr. day is being observed today in the US.  Like most other holidays, it's been observed on Monday for the past few decades.  I guess it makes more sense for offices, banks and such to close for three consecutive days than on a day in the middle of the week.  And, tell me, who doesn't like three-day weekends?

But I think this is one holiday that shouldn't be only for watching basketball games or taking advantage of sales.  I always try to pay homage to Dr. King, whom I regard as one of the few true American heroes.

I mean, for this alone, I'd give him a holiday--and even the Nobel Peace Prize:

Who could hate after seeing someone so enjoying himself?

Rolling By The Racists

In previous posts, I've mentioned that for years Florida has had, by far, the highest death rate for cyclists of any US state.

I have mentioned some of the possible reasons for it, based on professional research as well as my own experiences of riding in the Sunshine State.  Those reasons include the "car culture" of the state as well as the frequent indifference or even hostility law enforcement officials envisage when cyclists are injured or killed by drivers.

Now, it seems, there may be other factors: guns, for one, and old-fashioned racism for another.

The incident I'm about to mention didn't end with the death, or even serious injury, of a cyclist.  But it could have become the Emmett Till case of cycling because something that might or might not have happened brought racial hostility to the surface, and a gun from its holster.

All right, I was using "holster" metaphorically. What I mean, of course, is that a man pulled out his gun.

That the ugly incident happened the other day, when Martin Luther King Jr's life and work were commemorated, should not surprise anyone.  A "Wheels Up, Guns Down" ride, which included ATVs as well as bicycles, spun through the Brickell area of Miami.

A white woman accused a black teenager of riding his bicycle over her foot.  (I wonder whether that woman will recant on her deathbed.) A white man--who may have believed he was defending the woman's honor or some such thing--pulled out his gun and yelled a racial slur at the cyclist.

A young black person on a bicycle:  What could be more of a challenge to that man's or woman's reality?  And, of course, he gets backlash for it.  That alone gives him more in common with MLK than someone whom Mike Pence likened to the slain civil rights icon.

A Real Freedom Ride(r)

I am not the first person to say this:  Donald Trump's promise to "Make America Great Again" doesn't hold up because, well, America was never great.  No nation ever has been.  A few have been powerful and influential.  But great, no.

A nation should not be confused with a culture or people.  Whether or not a culture is great is open to interpretation.  Every nation, however, has at least one interesting or even inspiring culture:  That is the reason why I have taken trips to France, Cambodia and other places.  

Even though nations aren't great, and even if cultures might or might not be great, within each of them there have been great human beings.  Of course, most of us might be seen as great by some people, but not others.  There are a few, though, who are undeniably great.

Today is a holiday to commemorate one of them. Although his actual birthday came last Tuesday, his "birthday" is celebrated on the third Monday of every January.  I am talking, of course, about Martin Luther King Jr.  Whether or not you agree with the ways in which he tried to achieve his goals, it cannot be denied that this country, and this world, are better for his having been part of them.

Here he is, on Fire Island, just off Long Island,  seven months before he was assassinated:

Fifty Years Ago Today

Today I am going off-topic.

One of the most tragic events--no, I take that back, the single most tragic event--in the history of the United States took place fifty years ago today.

I am talking about the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

Now, I don't mean to diminish how terrible were the killings of John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X or the unfortunate souls who perished on 9/11.  They were all awful, and it could be said the country and this world weren't the same after them.  

Perhaps I see the murder of MLK as I do because it's the first assassination I can recall clearly.  I have only vague memories of JFK or Malcolm X, and the fall of the Twin Towers doesn't have a single tragic figure that stands out.  But, even at my tender age, I could see that Martin was emblematic (though neither I nor anyone else in my milieu at the time would have used the word) of everything that was necessary and possible.

Martin Luther King Jr. is kissed by his wife, Coretta Scott King as Nipsey Russel, back left, and Harry Belafonte, right, look on in 1963.

America is, of course, not alone in venerating its military leaders.  And I am not foolish enough to believe that this country, or the world, will ever exist without armies and munitions.  But the only hope the human race has, I believe, is to work toward, if not ending, then at least diminishing, the role of the military and war--and indeed all violence--play.  Doing such work, I believe, is inseparable from the struggles for social and economic justice.

That last sentence is something Martin understood, perhaps too well.  When he said as much, in a speech he gave exactly one year before he was gunned down, many of his longtime supporters abandoned him. President Lyndon Johnson championed both civil rights and America's involvement with the Vietnam War.  When Martin denounced the war, some of his supporters took it as an attack on the person who brought to fruition some of the things for which Martin and his followers fought.

Some Americans--including some of my acquaintance, a few of whom are related to me--simply cannot understand why Martin Luther King Jr. is "the only person with his own holiday."  In some states, at least, that is not the case: Lincoln's birthday is celebrated before "Presidents' Day".  But, really, if only one person in the United States of America is to have his or her own holiday, I cannot think of who else that person could or should be.

In short, I feel he is this country's greatest hero, and we are still hurting from losing him.                                                               

Who's Going To Make What Great Again?

Today I took two short rides: before and after having lunch with my mother and a friend of hers, of whom I am fond.

My rides took me through alongside creeks, swamps and woods, as well as through small-town streets lined with shabby houses and suburban subdivisions full of houses that are imitations or parodies, depending on your point of view, of structures built by Spanish, French and English settlers to this area.

Once again, the weather was delightful.  At one point, I even saw two frolicking fawns just yards away from me, and white herons that ambled even closer.  People seemed relaxed, even if they were doing home repairs or yardwork.  The kids were happy, of course:  They had the day off from school.

The reason is that today is the holiday to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr., who would have turned 88 yesterday.  He didn't live to see his 40th birthday, and many of the people for whom he fought had even shorter lives that ended as tragically as his.  A few years ago, a student of mine who is about a decade older than I am, and grew up in Jacksonville--about 105 kilometers (65 miles) from where I am now--told me about one of those victims: a relative whose flaming body dangled from a tree in Mississippi.  As a little girl, she saw that.

It probably wouldn't surprise you to learn that from 1882 until 1968, more black people were lynched in Mississippi than in any other state in the Union.  I don't think it would cause much consternation to say that the next states on the list were Georgia, Texas, Alabama and Arkansas.

Florida is right behind them.  The "Sunshine State", however, had the highest per-capita rate of lynchings among the states from 1880 through 1940.  In fact, Florida's lynch rate, in proportion to the population, was more than double that of Alabama and nearly four times that of Texas!

Today, as I rode through the subdivisions, and the ramshackle houses, I saw many "Trump:  Make America Great Again" campaign signs.  In fact, I even saw a couple in a trailer park.  I don't recall seeing so many campaign signs for any candidate still standing on lawns, or tied to signposts or windows, so long after an election as I saw today.  

Now, I am sure that some of those who voted for Trump--and, perhaps, a few who didn't--are resentful that King gets "his own" holiday: something no other individual  in the US has.  Or, to be precise, no other white individual has.

I can understand, even if I don't condone, what they feel:  that they are losing "their" place in society to "privileged" minorities (which, of course, can include LGBT people as well as any number of racial and ethnic identities--as well as "the 51 percent minority"). One thing my own experience has taught me is that privilege is something you don't know you have until you lose it, and the process of losing it is painful and can cause intense anger and resentment.

What are students learning these days?

What I can't understand, though, is something I saw on a news program this morning: People who claim that if King were alive today, he would have supported Donald Trump's election to the Presidency.  I tried to understand their arguments, but those of the Flat Earth Society  actually make more sense to me.

Of course, cycling and writing have made more sense to me than all of those things ever could.  So did those fawns and herons I saw.

One Way To Commemorate This Day

Today, on Martin Luther King Day, I thought it would make sense to share something I learned just recently:  He actually gave his "I Have A Dream" speech--albeit in a slightly different form-- for the first time in Detroit, some two months before the whole world heard him deliver it from Washington.

It's interesting that such a fact has been all but lost to history, especially when one considers how much sense it makes.  After all, he made his speech in Detroit right around the time it became a majority-black city.  Also, King had, by that time, realized that the struggles of the labor movement were part of an overall struggle for justice, and no city has ever been more emblematic of the American labor movement than Detroit.

It's thus fitting that there's a "Tour  de Troit" taking place today. If today's weather in the Motor City is anything like what it normally has at this time of year, I give "props" to whoever rides it.  

The name of the ride is kind of funny.  The name of the city itself means "strait" in French; Francophone settlers who came by way of Quebec named the then-settlement for "le detroit du lac Erie", which separates it from what is now Windsor, Ontario.

(If you are under-age, or of delicate sensibilities, please skip over everything else in this parenthetical element.  The second syllable--"troit"--means "narrow" and is pronounced the way Anglophones pronounce a vulgar term for a part of the female anatomy.  In fact, it's believed that British soldiers in World War I introduced the term in to the English-speaking world.)

Anyway, congratulations to everyone who is riding today. And thank you for everything, Dr. King!

A Year In Martin Luther King Jr.'s Life

I know it's Spring.  And it's time to ride. But I think there's something else that bears mentioning.

On this date in 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assasinated in Memphis.  I was a child at the time and, until that day, knew nothing about him. However, I think I understood, for the first time, what the word "tragedy" means and that it isn't the same as mere sadness or grief.

He was cut down one year to the day after making what might have been the most important speech of his life--and one of the most important in American history.

Before an audience of 3000 in New York's Riverside Memorial Church, the greatest leader this country has ever had declared, "My conscience leaves me no other choice."  Then he described the terrible effects of the Vietnam War on this country's poor as well as Vietnamese peasants.  Thus, he concluded, he could not continue to fight for civil rights and address the myriad injustices--all of which had to do with race, class and gender--that existed (and still exist) in the United States without opposing the war his country was waging in the former French Indochina.

Here is a video of that speech:

Looking Out For Whitelaw

Today was mild, if not exceptionally so, for this time of year.  The temperature reached 46F (8C).  The skies were overcast and a breeze from the west occasionally gusted.

It was all good enough for me to go for a bike ride.  And, given that today is a holiday (the day on which Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday is observed), I had time for a longish ride.

So what did I do?  I rode to Point Lookout:  105 km (65 miles) round-trip—on my fixed gear.  The ride is flat, but it’s still longer than I might normally do at this time of year.  So I’m feeling good about that.  Perhaps I am in better shape than I thought I was, and that bulge I feel in my belly is a paranoid delusion. (Dream on!)

Of course, these guys (or girls:  I, of all people, should not be sexist!) are always in shape.  How could they not be?

And they’re more intrepid than I am:  When the snowstorm we’re supposed to get arrives tomorrow, they’ll still be flying around, swooping down and scooping up food for which people pay good money in nearby restaurants.  Meanwhile, I’ll be in my place, preparing  syllabi for the coming semester and, possibly, soup or tomato sauce.

The avian avatars will miss out on such experiences—and the irony of seeing this on Martin Luther King Jr’s holiday:

I wonder if residents of the neighborhood—Ozone Park, Queens—have ever noticed.  At one time, not so long ago, they were all white.  (I know; I had relatives who lived there!) Now many of them are South Asian and/or Caribbean.  Did they have “Whitelaw” in their old countries?

Freedom Rider

On this date in 1929, Martin Luther King Jr. was born.   His birthdate will be commemorated on Monday, five days from now. We also observe the births of Presidents Washington and Lincoln, as well as other holidays, on Mondays in this country.

I guess if you want to become famous enough to have a holiday dedicated to you, you have to be born on Monday.  Or, perhaps, being born on Monday will lead you to fame.

But I digress.  I don't often hear or see MLK and bicycling mentioned on the same page, let alone the same sentence.  The biographies I've seen tell us that he enjoyed riding his bike as a kid but make no mention of him cycling as an adult.

From Dan's Globe Bike

So why am I mentioning him on this blog?  Well, I believe that my cycling is one major reason why I began to think about issues of social justice long before I would be affected by them in the immediate and visceral ways I would experience them when I was transitioning from male to female.  Riding my bike through New York--where I have lived much of my life--and other cities, I have seen, close-up, the stark differences between neighboring communities.  Just minutes after spinning by the opulent townhouses and boutiques of Manhattan's Fifth and Park Avenues--which rival Rodeo Drive, Kensington Gardens and l'Avenue Montaigne--I descend the ramp from the Triboro Bridge to the southern tip of the Bronx.  It's part of the 16th Congressional district, the poorest in the entire nation. There, I am as likely as not to be the only woman on a bicycle within a radius of several miles.

In both neighborhoods, people sometimes compliment the bike I'm riding, or (on rarer occasions these days) my riding itself.  In either neighborhood, I am keenly aware of my privilege:  Even if I am riding to work or an appointment, I am riding my bike by choice.  And I am riding a bike I choose to ride.  Even if I have no money in my purse, I still occupy a higher rung on the social--and, yes, economic--ladder then those who are riding bikes that no one else wanted so they can deliver pizzas or get to an appointment with a case worker.

As long as I can ride, and choose to do so, I am privileged.