This post will flow through my fingers from a sprinkled muddle
of thoughts and opinions that have been twirling around my brain for a few
days. A lot goes on in my life and in the world around me and all of us, and
sometimes I feel like writing when I’m at work or on the road and I have great
ideas for posts and then I forget them entirely and I end up typing a run-on
sentence that doesn’t stop when it should have but it will now.
The first thing I want to do is show you a picture.
Now, that’s just a picture of a taco to you, but to me it’s
a picture of love and acceptance, and the reason I love immigrants and
immigration. Every once in a while, we have a few minutes of spare time at work
and can make a small breakfast. This morning, it was chorizo tacos. My coworker
brought in fresh chorizo from the Mexican market near his home, and he sautéed up
some veggies and eggs and scooped a generous helping of avocado on top. We ate
quickly as we were setting up the line because we have no time to waste in the
morning. Even while he was cooking breakfast, he was doing a dozen other things
on his station and in his mind, getting ready for the day. My coworker is an
immigrant, and he’s my friend. He is from Mexico and his Spanish is way better
than mine.
Every day I try to learn a little more Spanish, and a little
more about his culture. He learned English the same way I am learning Spanish:
at work. His English is great, and it’s how we communicate, but I try to slip
in as much Spanish as I can because I want us to be equals, and I like learning
the subtle nuances between his Spanish and that from Colombia or Peru where two
of my other coworkers are from. They are a big reason I love my job. They, and
people like them, are a big reason I love my country. And they have noticed a
big change over the last couple years, specifically the last one year, 208
days, seven hours, thirteen minutes, and nineteen seconds as of the beginning
of this sentence. It’s even longer by now. All I will say is that immigrants,
whether legal or not, have a huge impact on everything we do and see, even if
you don’t see them. Please, support
them, say hi to them. Ask them questions. They love that shit. I love that
shit. It’s because we are people. All of us are people.
Rod Stewart is kind of a bitch. I mean, I don’t know that
for sure, but he ruined my plans this week. My plans were to see him and Cindy
Lauper in concert at the Xcel Center with my friends from down in southeastern
MN. He cancelled his show about 24 hours before it was supposed to start
because he has strep throat. I’m not the only one who observed that he already
kind of sounds like he has strep throat, so maybe he should stop being a baby
and sing. He did reschedule for October 14th, so we will go then.
And finally, for the first time in my life, this week I
voted in the primary election. I went into the city auditorium at about 3:30pm
and when I inserted my ballot, the counter went to 40. It’s a small town, but I
really do feel like every vote means something. I listened to MPR the following
morning and heard that of the 902,000 voters, over 600,000 were Democrats. This
is a good sign, I think, that maybe younger voters are getting out and showing
the current administration that they are done with this insanity. I’m grouping
myself in with the younger voters because I’m in my thirties. And I am sick of
living in a country run by a Twittiot. I just devised that term.
That’s all I have time to write about. I will be taking a
break for a while to work on a project involving this blog, actually, my former
blog which was a co-blog. I have a lot of new followers, so if you haven’t done
so before, take some time and check out the beginning of this story. You can access the original posts here
and read through an incredible journey. I will be back I’m sure in two weeks or
less, and I will let you know what I’m up to.
One last thought. Some day we will all die. Your first death will be when your body expires. The next when you are buried or cremated or whatever. And then some day, way, way, way, down the line, somebody somewhere will say your name for the last time. That will be the last of you. What will they say?
