JANINE HARRISON

Author Archives: Janine Harrison

• Each Voice a Stride

  Posted at 12:38 pm by Janine Harrison, on November 3, 2020

  

  The BLM flag attached to the car window ahead of me was threadbare from waving. As I drove through East Chicago, Indiana, neon “Roadway to Citizenship for our DREAMers,” “Stop Gary Airport Deportations,” and “545” signs taped to my car, I thought about how each 2020 protest caravan I’d attended had been different. The first, a Black Lives Matter funeral procession, which passed a police officers’ banquet, had garnered much attention from Blue Lives Matter counter-protesters. Horns blaring, yelling, and cursing pervaded the air. I could feel the hate lining the streets of our route, American flags hoisted, as though the right were somehow patriotic and protesting for justice and equality was not.

  The next caravan was the first of two “United Against Racism” events, this one located in Gary. Even though it wasn’t a funeral procession, it felt the most like one. The weather mourned countless Black lives lost, Breonna Taylor lost, emotions running as heavy as the storm clouds while we near-silently wove through overpoliced, underserved neighborhoods, residents coming out to watch and cheer us on.

  The second such event entailed hazard lights blinking and a morse code of beeps: … —… as the theme song of our interlacing of police department and Harbor blocks. Determined. Hopeful. When I returned home, I tried to peel my protest signs off of the car carefully as I’m growing tired of making new ones and know I will need them again.

  In ways, my life experiences prepared me for activism. And, as a writer who believes in writing as a high-level agent of social change and who increased my creative output with that intent in mind, I felt I was doing my part. Then, Trump was elected. My bestie and I soon found ourselves taking my teenage daughter to the first Women’s March on Washington, D.C. We ended the day with a poetry reading hosted by Split This Rock. There, Sarah Browning said the words I knew to be true but in saying aloud made real for me: “Writing poetry is no longer enough.”

  In Spring 2018, a young politician and activist, Brandon Dothager, whom I’d met a week or two earlier at a poetry slam I’d hosted as a town poet laureate, came to my house and recruited me into a new local community, that of Progressive Democrats, which I have since proudly played a very minor role in helping to foster in Northwest Indiana.

  Now, here it is – Election Day 2020, the day we’ve been waiting for — the fate of our nation never in greater peril. We hold our breath. We eat Tums like gummies. We try to stop our heartbeats from breaking through our chests…

  The thing is, no matter the outcome, even when we do pry Trump’s fingers from the White House fence, I’ve heard tell that many individuals will snap back to their pre-activist days like a twanged rubber band. But we can’t. We simply can’t.

  I would love to simply bounce back to life as just a writer and professor! (It sounds so freeing — the time gained, the world weight lost.) But these four years have shown me that whether the issue is new-ish or a hideous centuries’ old thread that has been sewn into our country’s tapestry, there is so much wrong, so much that needs to be done, so much that our Millennials, Z’s, and Alpha’s need to have a future that they deserve — instead of the one that we are misguidedly handing to them on a plastic platter — that I’ve realized I’m going to have to be an activist for the rest of my life, gaining political knowledge and speed as I go.

  Our societal situation is not unlike the sole issue of feminism in that the second we turn our backs strides will be lost. And now, tragically, we have many steps to regain just to reach the point where we can start to make progress again. Many people have likened recent events to the civil unrest of the 1960’s. Only this time, we are ready, and we need to carry the momentum into penetrating and permanent change.

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• American Flag as the Last Coffin Nail?

  Posted at 2:29 pm by Janine Harrison, on August 2, 2020

  

  Is it being a whiny White person to lament giving up on a national flag? After all, whole generations of marginalized citizen groups have felt betrayed by or never invested in the U.S. flag because the reality of our country has never lived up to the ideal the flag represents – not even close.

  Many kids today, my daughter included, have been raised to question the actions of society and to know that history is biased, written by those in power, and far from complete (the majority of women’s and People of Color’s voices having been excluded).

  But, I remember being in first grade and in my first school play. We had to dress up as pioneers. My mom bought me a long dress, green with a tiny flower pattern, an apron sewn into the front (ala Holly Hobby). She traced a circle on an old white bed sheet with marker using a Hills Bro’s. coffee can as a template, cut it out, made little slits, and wove a green ribbon through it, turning the flat sheet into a bonnet. I stood on a riser in front of our audience of parents and proudly stated my line, “His father kept searching low and high, till he found the naughty guy. George admitted, ‘It was I, I cannot tell a lie!’” I had recited the climax of the story of George Washington cutting down the cherry tree. After, we sang the “Cherry tree, chop – chop, chop” song.

  For years, I could remember every scene, every song in the play, which covered historical events ranging from the Paul Revere’s ride to Betsy Ross sewing the first American flag. The production made me feel so proud to live in such a great nation.

  (If you must vomit, please do so in the bathroom. Thank you!)

  I also remember celebrating 1976 because it was our country’s bicentennial. I may still even have a commemorative coin set stowed away somewhere.

  Years after I became a young adult and started to learn that many of the teachings about our “great nation” were actually myths, the truth much darker, frequently shameful, I remember the first time I felt a real sense of patriotism. Not the kind made out of blueberry stars and strawberry stripes on cake or more importantly, standing and respecting VFW members driving in convertibles in 4^th of July parades, but feeling patriotism in a contemporary, relatable sense. It was the day after 9/11. Even this was fraught with issues, I now recognize, but I’ll still never forget how I felt that day and for weeks to follow. The American flag flew everywhere. Strangers’ sorrow about the planes hitting the Twin Towers and Pentagon was practically palpable, even as we passed one another in the aisles of a store. We were struck tragically on our own soil, and it felt personal, and I felt “American” in a way I had never before known.

  But that was 19 years ago.

  Before racist backlash against our first Black president.

  Before police brutality reared its ugly head in the mainstream media, showing Whites that the USA isn’t even close to post “-ism” anything and ultimately, leading to the Black Lives Matter movement.

  Before Trump was elected, emboldening an ignorant, fearful, hateful mass of people who’ve had their heads buried in holes, evidently since the 1970’s or 80’s, to re-enter daylight, to shout, to bully, to injure, to murder, to blame “libtards.”

  Recently, I was in a Black Lives Matter symbolic funeral procession. Since the start of coronavirus, it was the first such protest in which I’ve participated. Counter-protesters, the Blue Lives folks, stood along our route, “patriotic,” with American flags a-plenty draped, hung on poles, even dangling from a tow truck. I wasn’t surprised by them or their intelligent comments, such as “Fuck you!” but I was taken aback by the sheer number of flags – by the audacity. It infuriated me to think that the counter-protesters considered their stance to be somehow “American.” That those who are hired to protect and to serve everyone murdering Black citizens historically through to the present day is somehow acceptable and that protesting the act is somehow unpatriotic, unAmerican.

  My husband, a social studies teacher, remarked, “But there is nothing more American than protest.”

  For me, the U.S. flag has always represented the ideal – what our country claimed to have been and should actually have been founded on: freedom and justice for all. (#blacklivesmatter)

  Infuriated, I wanted to scream: “This is NOT patriotism!”, I wanted to take the flag back from these hijackers. Despite the kneeling in recent years to show “we do not and will not support the status quo, this domestic colonization,” I wanted patriotism to not be owned by racists when it and the flag should live up to the hype – should walk the walk – should represent a loyalty ALL can feel in a just and equitable land, should represent freedom and justice for ALL!

  I guess I’m an idealist that way. I believe in living in the world the way it should be if it were better, instead of living in it as it stands. We can and should aspire, always, to societal betterment.

  Still riled, I suggested to heads of a couple of progressive groups after the funeral procession that we start flying the American flag at our events. That we work to take it back. I was reminded that the flag has always been problematic for disenfranchised Americans and that for this reason, we need to embrace new symbols.

  I grieve. Perhaps ridiculous and very White, all considered, I grieve what seems to me right now to be the loss of the American flag to Trump supporters and all the ugliness they symbolize.

  In an ideal world, we would be ready for a national rebirth. We’d make long-term changes in which we would create a safe, fair society for People of Color. We’d have a new independence day that ALL citizens could buy into and celebrate together because we finally overcame the tragic history and corrupt systems holding us back. We’d raise a new flag, symbolic of this awakening.

  I grieve because we aren’t there yet. And at the rate we are going, I may not see it in my lifetime.

  I grieve.

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• Kids’ Lit Wish List

  Posted at 2:48 pm by Janine Harrison, on March 1, 2020

  

  (Photo Uncredited: Information Not Available)

  I’ve had the privilege and joy of teaching Children’s Literature to undergraduate students, primarily elementary education majors, who are mostly early 20-somethings and from diverse racial backgrounds, this semester.

  I showed the class the 2016 Tedx Talks video, “Missing Adventures: Diversity and Children’s Literature,” in which Brynn Welch argues that we need more diversity. She argues essentially what my cousin, Abby, an educator, recently stated to me, which is that “Books need to be both ‘windows and mirrors’ for kids, allowing them to understand someone else’s experience and to see their own as a valuable part of society.” Welch revealed that less than nine percent of children’s books with human characters contain protagonists of color, white still being the “default setting.” Most of my students were taken aback, understandably, by this statistic.

  In the freewrite that followed, a couple of my Latinx students wrote that they had grown up with books containing white protagonists, never seeing themselves reflected in the writing, and equally as awful, never questioning it. It reminded me of growing up in the 70’s and 80’s with mainly male protagonists in children’s and young adult novels, many of which employed the generic “he,” and never questioning it. This is one way that we internalize that our voices don’t matter – whether as persons of color, as females, or as any other individuals who are not able to see their own reflections in the “mirrors” that are kids’ books. Another group that we discussed that day was Native Americans and lack of contemporary representation thereof. One student admitted, “I didn’t even know there still were Native Americans until I entered middle school. I thought they were all gone.”

  At the end of the period, a student and I were the last two left the room. She’s the mother of two children, one bi-racial and the other, Mexican American. I, myself, am the mother of a mestiza who is half-white/non-Hispanic, half-white/Hispanic. We talked about how hard it is to find children’s books that reflect bi-racial or bi-ethnic identities, but how important it is for our kids to feel as though they belong. I said, “When Jianna was little, she looked dark next to my white friends’ kids and white next to her half-brother’s Latinx family.” She vigorously nodded.

  Last week, I graded the students’ freewrites. For Part II, I had asked students what they thought was still missing, four years post-video, that they would like to see reflected more prominently in children’s literature. Our class wish list is as follows:

  More…

  • Muslims
  • Bi-racial families
  • Family type diversity (not just Mom and Dad), including same-sex parents as a norm
  • LGBTQ+ representation
  • Social class discussion
  • Work ethic focus
  • Routes to success, in addition to college and military
  • Mental health issue discussion
  • Neurodivergence
  • Grief/death processing
  • Puberty conversation
  • People with physical disabilities
  • Protagonists of color in which issues of race are not the focus
  • Racism in a contemporary context

  While I realize that strides in literature have been made over the past four years, we need to make certain that they continue, preferably at a faster pace, so as to be more reflective of contemporary society. In “Missing Adventures,” Brynn Welch reminds viewers that we show what we support, in part, through our spending. This year, if you can, please consider voting with your wallet by purchasing diverse children’s books as presents for the kiddos in your life — including white children — to help prevent raising kids who see the white race as “default”!

  #diversechildrensbooks #childrensliterature #kidsbooks

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• Numb and Sun: Time for Re-connection

  Posted at 4:04 pm by Janine Harrison, on January 12, 2020

  

  Last year, for the first time in a few years, I went MIA on my blog posts for months at a time. I had difficulty thinking of simple topics upon which to write 300-500 words. This is a bad sign for a writer.

  For a long time, I’d hear from college students, “I’m not feelin’ it.” Nowadays, some say, “Ya feel me?” I think many of you will understand when I admit that while I may feel what’s going on in the lives of others and across the globe (Iran, Australia, Puerto Rico, just to list recent events), in this overwhelming world, it’s sometimes difficult for me to feel what’s going on with myself. I go through life numb because there’s too much input and not enough time and energy for processing and output. For the artists reading along, you’ll understand, too, that this isn’t good for creating — to feel as though you’re somehow cut off from, well, your “soul.” I haven’t written a new poem in months!

  Shortly after Trump rose to power, I saw warnings about “activism burnout” posted on social media. More recently, I’ve read posts about empathetic people needing to “set boundaries.” And, goodness knows, we’ve been tossing around the term “self-care” for a while. Earlier this month, I actually turned a Pinterest pin about “Types of Self-Care” into a small poster and hung it on my office wall.

  Also, it doesn’t help me, personally, that it’s winter, albeit a mild one due to climate change (ugh!). I experience SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), usually in January and February, the most. My symptoms come in the form of trouble concentrating, sluggishness, agitation, and sleep issues. When it’s really bad, I feel like I roll through days in an anxiety-riddled fog. I am, without a doubt, a creature of summer. If you know me, you know that. If you’re in my inner-circle, you’ve probably bought me a blanket, a sweater, or winter weather accessories somewhere along the line. (Thanks again, by the way!)

  BUT, this year, I’m re-starting work to reconnect my brain, emotions, spirit, and body. So, you can expect monthly blog posts from me again (whether you want them or not!).

  I wish you all a 2020 of deep breaths, long sighs, time for reflection and connection, and much sunlight!

  Excuse me now while I go sit under my sun lamp and journal, followed by playing 2020 Just Dance with the kid.

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• The “You are Special Today” Plate

  Posted at 6:43 pm by Janine Harrison, on September 25, 2019

  

  Last night, my husband and daughter, along with our friend, Greg, met me after work at Tania’s restaurant in East Chicago, Indiana. They brought the bright red “You are Special Today” plate for me, which is a dinner plate given to the family by my mother-in-law, Wanda, who owned such a plate while my husband and his siblings were growing up. I chose the restaurant (delicious Puerto Rican food, by the way!), and after we sat down, Mike presented me with a card made out to the “Bold Poet” and a gift. It was a copy of Haitian-American writer Edwidge Danticat’s book, Create Dangerously, which worked both literally and symbolically, because it was reading her story collection, Krik? Krak!, that led to the reason why I was special yesterday in the first place!

  You see, yesterday my first full-length poetry collection, Weight of Silence (Wordpool Press) was released, and I was (am, actually) very excited! Recently, my poet-friend, Quraysh Ali Lansana, referred to the work as an “important labor of love,” which seemed apt.

  Cliff’s Notes version? Danticat’s writing put Haiti on my radar as more than a blip in the Caribbean and has subsequently led to two trips to the island thus far, considerable learning, the forming of friendships and even an unofficial new family member, and 111-pages of poetry on women’s issues, the tragic history, current sociopolitical situation, and natural disasters experienced by Haiti’s resilient people.

  The words found traction at Wordpool Press, a small press run out of Bloomington, Indiana, by editor Colleen Wells, who adopted her daughter, Gaelle, from Haiti, shortly after the horrific January 2010 earthquake in capital city, Port-au-Prince. Due to her empathy, 100 percent of not only poet profits but also Press profits made from Weight of Silence sales, will be donated to Haitian Connection! This invaluable not-for-profit organization helps to shelter, educate, care for the psychological and physical wellbeing, and feed Haitians, with a special emphasis on women and children. Naturally, I am thrilled by the perfect fit of work and publisher!

  Even though I lamented that the collection wasn’t ready for release when Hurricane Matthew devastated the southwest portion of Haiti in October 2016, I am thrilled that it was launched yesterday. Since the disaster, the country has experienced double-digit inflation, an oil crisis, and increased political unrest, to the extent that people living in the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere are in the worst straits that they have experienced in over two decades.

  If you are in the Chicagoland area, I hope to see you at one of my upcoming launch parties or readings! (See Upcoming Events.) If not, I hope that you will consider purchasing a copy from Amazon. While it would be counterproductive for me to actually send purchasers “You are Special Today” plates, please know that I would certain feel the sentiment!

  Thanks for reading!

   

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• CITA and More: Ways to Help Southern Border Immigrants

  Posted at 3:04 am by Janine Harrison, on July 29, 2019

  

  For some of us, armchair activism against the Trump administration’s assault against immigrants who are seeking asylum in the United States from across the Southern border isn’t enough. Yet, it is difficult to know how to help, especially for those of us who live in the Midwest.

  This summer, I started working with CITA (no, not the Chicago Indoor Tennis Association), the Chicago Immigrant Transportation Assistance via the ICIRR (Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights). Volunteers take shifts at the main Greyhound station, so that we may assist those immigrants who have been released from ICE and are en route to relatives’ homes.

  What I have learned thus far is as follows:

  • ICE releases individuals and families without cash. Instead, they are given pre-paid credit cards or (get this!) — checks — in lieu of any money they possessed when entering a detention center.
  • Immigrants arrive hungry. Many immigrants have been traveling on buses for hours or days (see above image), often starting from Texas or Louisiana. One wonderful volunteer assisted a family of three; the father had not eaten for over 48 hours and the mother and child, not for  24+ hours. CITA, which is actually comprised of several organizations, has a nearby Red Cross storage unit. From it, we are able to provide water, snacks, and meals. Often, we pass out lunches that we have on hand and then walk to storage to retrieve additional supplies. When we return, usually within ten minutes, the food has already been devoured.
  • Immigrants arrive sick. We keep medicine and personal products on hand for adults and children because by the time they reach us, they have headaches, sore throats, fevers, or coughs; women need menstrual provisions; and more.
  • Immigrants arrive without weather-appropriate clothing and shoes. For starters, ICE takes shoelaces during processing and doesn’t return them. We keep a supply of laces for this reason. Also, individuals who have lived in warm climates leave cold detention centers for trips on cold buses, heading north, without the benefit of long sleeves, pants, socks, or close-toed shoes. This was especially problematic in the winter and spring, I was told, with children arriving without coats and wearing sandals. We hand out clothing and shoes to accommodate such needs.
  • Immigrants need directions or use of a telephone. Most immigrants do not speak English. They sometimes need assistance to get on the correct bus or they need to speak to someone at their destination location to arrange pick up. We help them to navigate the bus station, so that they are ready to board their next bus. Sometimes, we loan an individual a cell phone to make a call. If an immigrant is lost, out of money, and needs another bus ticket, CITA will help in that capacity as well.

   

  If you wish to volunteer with CITA or cannot volunteer in-person but would still like to take part in this effort by making a donation of money or supplies, please contact
  info@citachicago.org or visit Cita Chicago

  Other ways to help our influx of immigrants from Central America and Mexico include:

  • If you are able, please consider paying the bond of an immigrant in need who is currently being held in a detention center or fostering or sponsoring a child awaiting immigration proceedings
  • Volunteer for migrant service agencies in your area that help refugees to transition to the United States
  • If you live near the border, bear witness.
  • And, of course, VOTE!

  Thank you for reading!

   

   

   

   

   

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• Eco-friendly Lessons We Can All Learn from My Great Depression-Era Parents

  Posted at 7:40 pm by Janine Harrison, on April 28, 2019

  Recently while reading an article on reducing plastic consumption, I realized that the intent was to sell environmentally-conscious products. While I’ll likely invest in bamboo toothbrushes for the family, since they are biodegradable, the remainder of the products seemed unnecessary.

  As I read and thought about our energy consumption, recycling issues, and plastic pollution, I could imagine my Great Depression-era parents shaking their heads at American excessiveness.

  Here is what we may learn from them:

  1. Whenever you leave a room, turn off the light. (An oldy but a goody!)

   

  2. If it isn’t broken, don’t replace it! Do we really need a newer model? A new bell, new whistle? Something that matches a new décor or a different season?

   

  3. If it is broken, can it be fixed? I realize that we live in a disposable society and that sometimes it is more costly to fix an item than it is to replace it; however, sometimes a little effort, ingenuity, and perhaps the addition of an instructional youtube video can go a long way (and save a few precious pennies in the process)!

   

  4. If something cloth is no longer wearable or presentable in the kitchen or bathroom, can it be added to a rag bag for future dusting, polishing, wall washing, dog drying, etc.? Do we really need to buy dust cloths or disposable cleaning wipes or synthetic sponges?

   

  5. Reuse bags. Paper bags can be filled with paper and cardboard products destined for the recycling bin. Plastic bags can line garbage cans and wastepaper baskets. Why buy them? Similarly, (and this post-dates my parents!) pretty, sustainable bags for the grocery store are a waste of money and material, if we have already amassed a quantity of free recyclable bags. Instead, use them and/or canvas bags until they’re thread bare. In fact, use everything until it’s thread bare!

   

  6. Most American homes already contain a cajillion plastic containers in the kitchen. Why waste plastic wrap and tin foil if we can stick leftovers into bowls and cover them with lids? Why not use the plastic until it’s unusable and not replace it? Then, better options can be explored.

   

  7. Remember glass? Maybe you’re too young. Why buy individually bottled beverages when water can be poured into a glass pitcher and flavors added or it can be turned into lemonade or iced tea? Glass and other non-plastic reusable water bottle options abound today.

   

  8. My parents were the type who stuck the last sliver of a soap bar to the new soap bar. (They scraped every bowl clean. They got every last drop out of a shampoo or ketchup bottle by turning it upside down and letting the liquid flow down into the cap.) While many of us today now use liquid soap and shower gel, we can reduce plastic use even via use of large refillable containers. And do we really need to buy new bottles of window and counter cleaners or can we make our own and re-use the last purchased plastic bottle?

   

  9. As for plastic utensils, why can’t we start washing real forks, spoons, and knives again, even when we are on the go? If afraid of throwing away the ones that belong to our matching kitchen sets, perhaps we could pick up some odd ones from a local thrift store or flea market? Regarding disposable plastic, we can also ask ourselves – unless they are a medical necessity, do we really need straws at all?

   

  10. Donate, sell, or give away anything and everything that is still usable.

   

  I realize that most of us are “whores to convenience,” myself included, and that in relation to some of the above-mentioned suggestions, I’m being hypocritical (e.g. 16 oz. Diet Coke bottle), but I am increasingly striving to do better, and I hope that we all will because, after all, what is a little inconvenience as compared to further risking the future of our planet? And let’s admit it, Americans – when it comes to energy consumption and pollution of all types, we’re disproportionately high contributors! So, let’s do better, and better still!

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• Flying Over: A Visit to Ciudad de Mexico

  Posted at 4:00 pm by Janine Harrison, on March 31, 2019

  

  Earlier this month, I had a reprieve from the heaviness of U.S. political chaos via a short vacation to Mexico City with one of my two besties, Jackie Larson. We stayed with a wonderful couple, Minerva and Leo, who were born and raised in Mexico, and it proved both a lovely diversion and a great learning experience!

  It was my first time in a non-touristy area of Mexico, and it felt like I was visiting the “real” country for the first time. I did what I always do when traveling internationally and enrolled in STEP (Smart Traveler Enrollment Program) through The U.S. Department of State – Bureau of Consular Affairs. While on the site, I reviewed travel warnings. Ciudad de Mexico was only at a two on a scale of four and included such usual warnings as petty crimes like purse snatching and pickpocketing.

  To be honest, my main concern was whether or not I should have a custom t-shirt made to wear in public that, in Spanish, read, “I hate Trump, too!” But I didn’t. Still, I braced myself for at least some animosity. If I had thought about it more carefully, I would have realized that in one of the largest cities in the world, not all white/non-Hispanic travelers would originate from the United States, and it was not as though I wore an American flag on my person so as to be easily identifiable. While I could chalk my attitude up to the U.S. tendency to think we are the sun and all other countries revolve around us, in all honesty, I think that being ashamed of living in a society that is currently led by an administration whose belief system is rooted in hatred and fear has simply made me extra self-conscious in relation to those people being targeted, Mexicans especially.

  I am pleased to report that not one Mexican was less than polite to either Jackie or me. For an enormous city, I found the residents to be warm and lovely!

  While there, I learned from our fantastic hosts a couple of fun facts worth sharing:

  1. “Huevos a la Mexicana” is so-named because the tomatoes, onions, and jalapeños are the color of Mexico’s flag.
  2. I confirmed what I had once heard, which was that Mexicans answer the phone, “¿Bueno?” instead of “¡Hola!” The origin is likely that when telephones were first installed, the lines often weren’t clear and users answered, asking, “Good?” as in “Is the line good? Can you hear me?” The greeting simply outlived its need.

  Although I do not consider myself to be a “foodie,” I do appreciate food and could go on and on about the meals that I ate (particularly the fresh seafood and a sandwich called a Pambazo!). However, due to length expectations for blogs I’ll spare you the savory details and just strongly suggest that you use your imagination and allow your mouth to water now!

  

  My favorite place was without a doubt the Blue House (Museo Frida Kahlo). Even though I was saddened as I grew to appreciate Frida Kahlo as a disabled artist, as evidenced by a wheelchair at an easel and numerous rigid corset-like back braces in her wardrobe collection, I was also surrounded by beauty in each room, in the light that shone into the interior, and while sitting in the courtyard, filled with Aztec-design statues, fountains, and ponds and much flora and fauna. The residence had such creative energy, and I felt such at peace. I was ready to move in right then and there to live and write!

  

  While at Museo del Templo Mayor, a museum connected to a large archeological dig site in which approximately two city blocks of the Aztec capital city of Tenochtitlan was unearthed, I remembered the first time that I traveled to NYC and realized that Chicago was young. Then, later, when I was sitting on a fallen column dating back to the Roman Empire, I finally understood, emotionally, that my country was still a baby. This led to two additional thoughts. The first was an appreciation for ancient civilizations, and how much they were able to discover and do with almost no technology or modern-day understanding of the world. The second was that maybe once the United States is able to extricate itself from the whines and tantrums of the orange-haired infant currently shaking the White House, maybe we’ll be able to right the furniture and begin to toddle as a nation. Here’s to hoping!

  #travel #Mexico City #Ciudad de Mexico #Donald Trump

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• Not Belonging, the Green New Deal, and Milk

  Posted at 5:13 pm by Janine Harrison, on February 25, 2019

  

  I just read the Green New Deal. It has been characterized by some politicians as “the toughest opening bid in history.” Yet, political cartoons exist in which it is criticized as unrealistic and something that would drain the United States monetarily.

  Just before I turned 30, I got into a jet skiing accident going full throttle, and it shook me up. I would soon need seven stitches on my chin and turn into a walking bruise. A guy that my friend and I were jet skiing with gave me a very strong drink to settle me down. Unfortunately, it did anything but that because I was already in a bad place emotionally – horrible break up with a dysfunctional man who had betrayed my trust in myriad ways, unemployed as a consequence of moving home to my mother’s house, turning 30 while living with my mother, and more. On the way and once home, I cried hysterically and repeatedly screamed, “I don’t belong in this world!” I thought it too cruel.

  Sometimes, like right now, I still feel this way.

  Call me an idealist (because I am), but I don’t see the Justice Democrat’s Green New Deal as anything but what the United States should not only want to do, but as something that as a world leader, we should have begun implementing quite some time ago.

  What has happened to us as a people? As a country?

  An argument could be made that dating back to our founding fathers, who were protective of landowners and wanted to keep the non-landowners down, we have been greedy bastards. However, that greed has escalated.

  I remember going to New Zealand when I was in my thirties and staying on a sheep farm for a few days. The house was functional. It was not up to date fashion-wise, and the pots and pans and dishes did not match. It made me think about seasonal throw pillows and holiday-related hand towels and dish towels, and costumes for pets, and a gazillion other unnecessary material objects that U.S. citizens possess while people in other areas of the world are dying of starvation and many of our own residents, including children, experience “food insecurity” (a euphemism for “are going hungry on a regular basis”).

   

  While portion sizes today are ridiculous in general, I once went to a fancy restaurant in Chicago, and my family of three returned to our hotel room with something like 12 “to go” boxes. And when desserts passed our table, each plate contained seemingly one-quarter of a three-layer cake. It was insane! I will never eat there again.

  Maybe it is because I grew up with Great Depression-era parents. I’ve told this story before, but it bears repeating. My mom said that when she was a girl in rural Minnesota, even if a family was low on milk, if a baby on a farm nearby had no milk, the family that was low gave the rest of their milk to the baby in need. It’s called being decent human beings.

  When there is undeniable evidence that the United States disproportionately contributes to a problem that affects the global community at such a magnitude that fatalities continue and the doom of future generations is a likely outcome, then who are we to call ourselves a “world leader” if we use money as an excuse not to do everydamnedthing in our power as expediently as possible to not only correct our behavior but also set an example for other countries? In other words, be decent human beings.

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• Jury Duty: The Rape Trial

  Posted at 4:36 pm by Janine Harrison, on January 27, 2019

  

  I’ve been summoned for jury duty. When I let a male boss know, he recounted how he’d been a foreman at a rape trial and found it “interesting and educational.” In response, I let him know that I’d also been the foreman at a rape trial, which I proceeded to describe as “memorable.” “Traumatic” would have been a more honest descriptor.

  I was 19 years old. It was in Chicago, 1987, and the first trial for the Pill Hill rapist, who was convicted in seven rapes, all together.

  During jury duty selection, the male judge learned that I was a student at University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, his alma mater, and that somehow bonded us, at least in his mind.

  During the trial, which lasted several days, the judge commented on the fact that we were the only jury he had ever had in which the jurors took different seats in the jury box each time that we entered the courtroom.

  The trial was ugly. The accused was a poor, undereducated black man from the south side of the city. His confession read as though it had been written by a third grader. He would wait for women to get off of a CTA bus and then drag them into a nearby alley to rape them, using a box cutter knife as his weapon. Photos showed much of this particular victim’s blood soaked into the surface of the unpaved alley.

  As luck would have it, toward the end of the trial, we entered the room, and I sat down in the front row on the side closest to the attorney’s tables. The accused had a scar leading to his penis that was identified by the victim and prosecution wanted us to see it, since it was evidence. They made the defendant bare it. I was the one sitting closest to where he stood with his lawyer when he unzipped his pants and pulled down his underwear. I was a still relatively innocent 19-year-old woman and on one hand, I was embarrassed to have to look at the evidence, and on the other hand, felt it was my responsibility to force myself to do so because it was crucial to the case. The defense attorney could not have made the situation any worse when, staring straight at me, he asked, “Need a closer look?”

  I must have turned a shade of red I’d never been before.

  To this day, decades later, I question the remark. What did that attorney gain from such sarcasm directed toward a young woman in an awkward situation?

  When we deliberated to review the case, I was, as mentioned, foreman (now “foreperson”), and we were thorough. We went over the confession and every aspect of the case and shred of evidence available to us to determine this young man’s innocence or guilt. After all, his life hung in the balance.

  After doing so, we returned to the courtroom and gave our “guilty” verdict.

  Just after court was adjourned, the judge’s final comment was: “What took you so long?”

  I’m really hoping for a traffic case this time.

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