MLK Commemoration

I went on a Martin Luther King commemoration run in the District this week so that I could stand in the presence of greatness, in the shadow of the towering, brooding Dr. King statue at the MLK Memorial on the Tidal Basin.  It's directly across the water from the Jefferson Memorial which is dedicated to our third president, a slaveowner who enslaved his own children that he had with his paramour, slave Sally Jennings.  (Far away, illuminated like two shining cities on the hills, The MLK Memorial on the left and the Washington Monument on the right.)

 
Enroute to the MLK site I ducked into the basement of the Jefferson Memorial to use its facilities (runners always know where there are bathrooms on their usual routes) and, strolling through the bookstore down there to catch another few minutes of warmth before I ventured back outside into the cold again, I noticed they sold little books of the US Constitution (it's not very long, even with all of the amendments included), and I asked the clerk how much the purchase of 53 copies would be so I could run across the Mall to the Capitol and deliver them to the Republican senators there currently railroading the rigged impeachment trial through the process in the hope that those 53 craven sycophants might read it for the first time.  The $20 bill I was carrying wouldn't cover the purchase so I couldn't save our country from sliding into a kleptocratic autocracy; always the wise guy!  (Reflections cast by the Father of our Country.)

I made it to the King Memorial a few minutes later, avoiding the ruined, silt-covered buckling footpath (the entire seawall is sinking and the footpath is often flooded in large stretches) by cutting through the FDR Memorial next door.  There I reflected for a few moments upon the King legacy, an uplifting bequeathal to us during my very lifetime time, and ruminated sadly upon how quickly and low we have sunk to as a result of a single foreign-assisted reckless presidential election cycle, an interference sure to be repeated later this year because the faux president and the Senate led by Moscow Mitch have, for whatever corrupt reasons compelling them, not taken a single step to assure that the chaos doesn't get even worse the next time.  (He had a Dream.)

Sad for my country, I finished my run albeit encouraged personally because although my pace was slow, the four miles went easily, my longest run in months since I cut back my mileage total way back in the fall due to a series of nagging leg problems.  Maybe, like my running health, my country will get better come November despite my anxieties.  (I have a dream that a better America is coming...)

50 years ago humanity lost a towering giant

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. The true neighbor will risk his position, his prestige, and even his life for the welfare of others.”

“When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”

“Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like any man, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

The Greatest Demonstration for Freedom in our Nation

Five score years ago a great American in whose symbolic shadow we stand today signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into the beautiful
sympathy of brotherhood.

Let freedom ring.

More of the Same.

Yesterday was the Martin Luther King holiday, so as is my wont on holidays, I had lunch at noon at the local gourmet pizza restaurant.  Any of my three estranged children are free to join me at these lunchtime fetes, but they had their wills severely overborne by their mother and her coterie of "professionals" as minors during the lengthy, costly divorce orchestrated by her, and I guess they're still mesmerized by her domineering influence as adults.

Western domestic law, it's a total failure and would be an absurd joke except that its ramifications are so serious, tearing families apart permanently, depleting every estate it gets its claws into and totally bankrupting everybody's emotions, especially the children's.  I got to thinking while I dined with the empty chair again that, although I have seen recent pictures and obtained a little information on the internet about the doings of my oldest and youngest sons, I haven't had a scrap of information about my middle child nor seen a picture of him in over a decade.

I don't know if I would recognize this son of mine, now a man if he's living, if I was looking straight at him while asking him for directions at a bus stop.  I always walk around the food establishment after I order and try to look closely at any man around thirty who is present, but you can't just stand near a table and peer intently at diners in a restaurant so who knows?

Now there's even a wife of one of them in the mix, she too is welcome to come join me for lunch any holiday or birthday there, and I hope the studies I've read about the extreme disaffection and lack of any emotional attachment these victimized children display as adults are all wrong.  I plan to be at the Lost Dog Cafe in Westover for lunch at noon on Presidents Day, kids.

Martin Luther King holiday

It's Martin Luther King Day.  He was born on yesterday's date in 1928.

I don't particularly like the memorial constructed in his honor in DC because its statue is too brooding and makes him looks vaguely Asiatic.  Maybe that's because it was carved by a Chinese artist, you know, made in China.

Dr. King was a great man, an American hero.  He uttered a statement that resonates today in light of the Trump scandal of how much The Donald's election to the presidency was propelled secretly or not so secretly by his comrades the Russians, which seems not to bother many of those who voted for him at all:  "In the end, we will not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."

He won the Nobel Peace prize in 1964 and was assassinated in 1968.  JJD&L, I'll be having lunch today at noon in the usual spot, please come join me, my treat.

Saying Goodbye to Amy

(My noontime running buddy, H, on the left with her friend, A.)

Last month a running buddy of mine at work asked if I would conduct an evening historical run on the Mall with her and a friend of hers who was leaving her job in DC to attend graduate school at the University of Chicago, as a sort of going away present from one Chicago native to another.  Because I was a history major and I like pointing out historical tidbits during runs, I readily agreed.

(The view of the Mall from the Lincoln.)

My plan was to run from our work area near Union Station to the Capitol then down the Mall to Lincoln and back, pointing out references along the way, but due to time constraints that was a monument too far so we doubled back at World War I.  A run on the Mall has innumerable things to see and infinite things to ruminate on.

(The view of Capital Hill from Labor Hill (the top of the steps at the Department of Labor),)

We ran to the Japanese American Memorial on Louisiana Avenue first and contemplated the great injustice done during World War II to the Japanese-Americans in the country, who were relocated from the west coast to bleak barbed-wire enclosed internment camps in the interior due to war hysteria.  Many of these loyal Americans lost everything as a result yet this terribly maligned ethnic group unfailingly remained true to the country, even furnishing a much-decorated combat brigade that was famous for its bloody, heroic service in our Italian campaign slugging match against the Germans.

(The Imprisoned Cranes statue,)

Next we stopped in the little park at the bottom of Capital Hill to view the towering statue of Robert A. Taft, the powerful Republican senator from Ohio from mid-last century, respected, if grudgingly, by all as an outstanding legislator although not admired by all for his isolationist policies.  The statue of Freedom atop the Capitol deserved a point-out from this location as well.

(General Winfield Scott Hancock, hero of Gettysburg.)

Along First Street NW we ran by the Peace Statue, the Civil War statue diorama dedicated to General Grant and the statue of our "martyred president" James Garfield, who was shot nearby by a disappointed office seeker before Garfield had even served a half year as president.

(Looking down Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol grounds at dusk.)

I showed my co-worker H and the departing student A my favorite pocket park on the Mall with its quietly burbling (in season) fountain and its ever-changing array of flowers and plants inside its elevated curvy brick walls.  Then we ran by the working National Carousel, a fine example of a 1940's era Merry-Go-Round, the Smithsonian Castle with its statue of Joseph Henry out front, past the Holocaust Museum  on the left and the Washington Monument on the right and straight through the National Tulip Library, a year-round working flower-bed garden on the Jeffersonian Tidal Basin, to the Martin Luther King Memorial right next to the FDR Memorial.

(At the entrance to the Pocket Park.)

We started back by running past World War I to World War II.  At this memorial I showed them the battle names etched in stone of the two battles my father fought in (a First Marine Division veteran), the several Pacific sea battles my uncle fought in (a shipboard gunnery-officer Marine), the campaign another uncle participated in as a rear-echelon support officer hunting down fugitive Japanese troops in the Philippines, the campaigns another uncle participated in while piloting a B-26 Marauder in the Mediterranean and the battles fought in by a Third Army (Patton's army) veteran I had the pleasure of meeting in recent years, the father of a close friend of mine.  All of these heroes are departed now.

(The Washington Monument, with its steel-beam exoskeleton complete, is undergoing repair to fix damage it incurred during the 2011 earthquake.)

The visit to World War II produced the hit of the running tour because I told H and A about the hidden memorials dedicated to Kilroy, as in "Kilroy was here", and showed them to them (there are two identical semi-concealed monuments to the ubiquitous Kilroy).  H and A both found the story fascinating and were delighted to see the long-nosed caricatures.

(The National Carousel.)

We had to hasten our pace as time grew pressing but we ran by the great petrified wood block outside the National History museum, telling its tale about the work of president Teddy Roosevelt preserving our national heritage, the Archives building containing its monumental documents dedicated to individual freedom, the Federal Trade Commission building with its fine statues depicting a man reigning in the powerful horses of commerce and trade, past the statues dedicated to the heroic general Winfield Scott Hancock and the triumphant general George Gordon Meade, both of Gettysburg fame, and over the small Labor hill affording a good view of the Capitol.  A few-block run down New Jersey Avenue back to the Georgetown Law School ("I'm not a potted plant!") completed our historical fun run.

(The National Tulip Library in springtime.)

There were lots more historical places we could have run past within 5 or 10 minutes of where we actually were, such as the John Paul Jones statue, the Jefferson, the George Mason seat, Korea, Iwo Jima, the Dutch Bell Tower, the Pentagon, the Air Force Missing Man statue, Arlington National Cemetery, Vietnam, Einstein, the White House, the First Division statue, the Boy Scout statue . . .shall I go on?  Any 60 minute run on the Mall can only partially expose all the places to visit in the City of Monuments, each site with a story or stories to tell.

(Good luck in Chicago!)

And we're off . . .

. . . into the new decade. Happy New Year's!

My friend who is a coach asked me to to take out a less advanced group tomorrow morning, six miles. The coach's more advanced group is doing nine miles. This ought to be a good kick-start for me to get back into running.

I only ran three times in December, three miles with a fast group (9:30 miles which just about killed me, they did six miles, I did three), once with a friend on the C&O Canal for four leisurely miles which was just right, and once leading a holiday lights run around the District with a group from work. I hope my ankle holds up.

And Daniel W. Lamberton, I'm sorry that I missed you for lunch today. The meal was delicious. I ate enough for the both of us.

Our next opportunity to re-connect after seven years is the MLK holiday. On Martin Luther King holiday, Monday, January 18, 2010 at 12N, I'll be having lunch at Five Guys Burgers in greater Falls Church (Merrifield) at 2960 Gallows Road, Dan. That's right next to the Unique Thrift Superstore, a terrific store in its own write. Come join me, on me!

We'll catch-up (ketchup, get it?) over fatty hamburgers and fresh-cut french-fries, an artery clogging but oh-so-delicious meal! Hope to see you then! Love you, Dad.

We are free at last.

Monday was a federal holiday, Martin Luther King Day. Dr. King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 for his work in promoting racial equality through non-violent means. On August 28, 1963, Dr. King cried out these words from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC to a gathering of a quarter million onlookers and supporters.

We have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Today in honor of Dr. King, the weekly running group I lead at noon from my agency ran down to the spot on the Tidal Basin where the future Martin Luther King Memorial will be constructed, next to the FDR Memorial. It will have a full view of the Jefferson Memorial across the water and be within sight of the Washington Monument through the trees.

In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

From a moment’s reflection at this quiet spot, we ran on down the Mall to the Lincoln Memorial, from which steps Dr. King spoke his famous words on that portentous day.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope.

The group climbed the high steps of this temple of freedom and looked out over the hallowed plain of equality containing its oases of sacrifice manifested by the Vietnam Wall, the Korean War Memorial, the WWI Memorial, the WW2 Memorial and in the far away distance, the Civil War Memorial shimmering in front of the Capitol. Then we ran back along the Reflecting Pool to work, having travelled four miles immersing ourselves in history and having spent forty minutes basking in greatness.

So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"