protest

This morning I went to my first protest. It was a war protest put on by Veterans for Peace. There were about 20 people there? We held signs. I thought there might be chanting, but there was none. One of the signs said "Honk for Peace" and lots of people honked. When someone honked, protesters gave them a peace sign and sometimes cheered.

It was held at the Arden Fair mall, probably Sacramento's largest mall. We stood on a street corner.

There were only a few negatives. I guess someone yelled, "Yes on 8!" at us, but I didn't hear it. And someone said, "War! War! War!" as he drove by. A teenager flipped us off. I thought there would be a lot more negatives, so I was pleasantly surprised.

I was holding a sign that said "Bring Them Home" and most of the time I was also holding a big American flag with white peace signs on it instead of the stars. Toward the end I got tired of "Bring Them Home" and flipped my sign over--on the back was a peace sign.

I think from a distance the flag I was holding looked like a regular American flag, so that was probably an interesting combination. You know how conservatives are more associated with the flag than liberals. I think my message was that peace is patriotic.

I went with my friend H. She is in Code Pink--she runs Sacramento's Code Pink. She made a sign that said "Will Dance 4 Peace" and danced a lot. She was and is adorable. At one point she was dancing in the median. So then a few cops on motorcycles came over, and one of them told her she couldn't do that or she'd get a ticket.

I really liked being at this protest. It was nervous-making for me to meet so many new people, but they were friendly and kind. After the first half hour or so, I felt pretty comfortable. I plan to go to more protests.

Saturday is a protest about prop 8 at city hall from 10:30 to 5:30. We're thinking about going to that, part of it at least. I would have to miss choir practice. Saturday's prop 8 protest is part of a nation-wide campaign to repeal prop 8. In case you don't know or can't recall, prop 8 is the gay marriage prop which won, banning gay marriage in California. My friends and I are very opposed, and I guess we're not alone. Law suits have been filed, and maybe it will be repealed.

In other news, our prompt is supposed to score out today, which is so early it's unheard of. So I should be scoring right now, but I thought I'd take a break to blog.