Deborah Lipp

My back’s been hurting like crazy. I hauled too much luggage or something. And I came home from the chiropractor, feeling a bit better after my adjustment, but still really stiff, like my lower back was fighting me. Getting out of the car felt awkward and tight, and I was tired and just dragging.

My driveway was full of leaves. I live in a condo complex, and we have landscapers, so I have no chores in regard to the leaves, I just noticed them.

Then I went to get my mail and I kicked my feet through the leaves. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. Through ankle-high leaves. It felt so good. So good. It was like a tiny miracle. It wasn’t about my back anymore, or about my day at work, just three or four seconds of whoosh whoosh whoosh through the leaves.

Then I got the mail.

And went whoosh whoosh whoosh on my way inside. It felt just as good the second time.

My step-mother sent me this article about Ashfield, Massachusetts. We lived there from 1972 to 1977 (if I am not mistaken).

This is a sacred and special place for me. It is where I discovered the sacred voice of nature. It is where I first began worshiping the Goddess by moonlight. The pictures are mostly in town, although there’s a beauty of the lake; we lived outside of town, on a dirt road. But the feeling is there.

I don’t remember who I voted for the first time. Local races. My second vote, in 1980, was for Jimmy Carter. I had changed my address when I went to college, and they didn’t have my page, and I was at the Board of Elections demanding my right to vote until minutes before the polls closed. The race had already been called for Reagan by the time I voted, but I was BY GOD going to exercise my franchise.

So by 1992, I’d never voted for a winner. And since I’m a pretty far-left liberal, a progressive as we’re termed now, I’d never even voted for my candidate of choice in the primary. Because, you see, I’m from New Jersey, and our primary used to be in June, and by June you’ve usually got your actual nominee, and even if you don’t, the far-left candidates have long since been defeated.

(In my life, the only time I’ve voted for my candidate of choice in a primary was Bill Bradley the day before he conceded to Al Gore in 2000. And then a couple of weeks later I found out that my voter registration had been screwed up and my vote wasn’t counted—it was my first vote in New York).

So anyway, here’s the thing. I never voted for a winner until 1992, and minutes after getting into office, Clinton signs Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and I felt betrayed. We of the far left felt we’d put him into office, just as the radical right felt they’d put Bush into office, and we felt betrayed.

At that point, I was done. Washed my hands. Fuck politics. In 1996, I didn’t vote. I’d just moved to New York, and I couldn’t trouble myself to change my registration in order to vote for Clinton, when in truth it didn’t feel better or different than politics my whole life. I thought it would be different.

Then came Bush.

Can we say “learned my lesson”? I knew we could. In 2000, I kind of believed Nader that there wasn’t a substantive difference between the candidates. I was wrong.

And here’s what I’ve learned. I will have to fight Obama. Without a doubt. He is more centrist than I am. He has already wobbled and wavered on gay rights, for one thing. It will not be Utopia; dancing in the streets was for Tuesday night, and now it’s back to work. The work of creating a more progressive society has not ended and will not end. But it is better, far, far better, to do that work with a liberal in the White House.

So I promise, here and now, not to become bitter when Obama pisses me off. I promise not to walk away again.

Yes we can.

Even though only Daven named the theme, I think everyone kinda had it.
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