Sentimental me

I've been absent with a migraine that went on and on for days, even as the blip about Tumisang garnered more stars, hearts, and comments than I could believe possible. Thank you so much for your generosity. Eight of the last ten days were migraine. I can't handle a screen when I'm in the grip of it.

But today I'm coming back to myself, and I've started a major housecleaning, making boxes for gifts, recycling, donations, trash, and books to take to Powell's for recirculation. I'm being ruthless. I found this old lanyard and ID made for me during Occupy Portland in 2011. It's useless. The cops and the government never honored it a single time. But The Portland Occupier is still being published (sporadically), and I'm still making photographs for it.

Backstory: I retired and moved to Portland in February, 2008, not knowing a single person here. It was brave, I guess, and I was sometimes lonely till I joined Blip. Seth and Cristina decided to move here in 2010 and then Bella was born in 2011, the same year Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Portland started and I found a place for myself as an activist/photographer. It was in that messy, idealistic, hopeful movement that I began to connect with people who are still my community now. That was also the year I met Sue and joined her Buddhist sangha. Everything finally came together. This lanyard says all that to me and reminds me how young I was then and full of fire and loving fury. I kept it; whoever cleans up after I'm gone can throw it away, but I can't. I'm letting go of heaps of other stuff.