the same story

I can feel the dark descending, each day getting shorter, and the cold streaming in thru all the many cracks and crannies in this old Victorian house. Coming back to my beloved San Francisco, one of the first things I heard about is how some of my friends have been struggling to get an accurate telling of our experience in Seattle challenging the WTO. There’s a movie being made, The Battle In Seattle, which comes complete with real Hollywood stars like Charlize Theron and Woody Harrelson. For years, hanging out at the Black Cat, reminiscing about various actions and uprisings we’d fermented, we’d imagine movies being made about us, and who would play us. Finally, this day has come. Characters will be amalgams, mixtures of many of us, but at least one comrade will play herself, facilitating a spokescouncil meeting, I think. It helps that she’s stunningly attractive, but heck, it is a Hollywood production.

As fate would have it, last night I saw Bobby, the movie just out centering on Bobby Kennedy’s assassination, and the cultural climate of the time. The characters, other than Bobby, like the ones in the Seattle movie, are fictionalized, each reflecting a facet of that particular moment in time, a time not unlike now. It was a troubled time, a time of war and fear for the future, a time where anything or anybody who inspires hope becomes a beacon. The movie was an ensemble piece, with no one person playing the hero, where reality is woven out of a mixture of stories. I love Aquarian films like these.

I’m fearful that this will not be the case with this Seattle film. A real paradox, because although Bobby centers on an heroic figure, it’s strength as a film is that it is ensemble, made up of many stories. What happened in Seattle was totally an ensemble piece, with no one hero emerging, but many stories. As my friend Patrick says, “It’s not the story of the battle, but the battle for the story”. Some of those I organized with before Seattle and was eventually arrested with have been battling for this film to reflect our stories, and visions. I’m hoping that something we value shines thru, and at the very least, the heroic nature of non-violent civil disobedience is showcased. My guess is the role of witches both inside and outside the jail will not be mentioned, but hopefully there might be a glimpse of a sign that says "Wake Up, Muggles, Banish Corporate Rule and Conjure Justice!" I still smile to think of the little blimp we had and the many signs, ponchos, and bumper stickers with these words enscribed.

Solstice approaches. It is the dark of the year, that time when many humans do rituals of hope for the return of the light, for peace on earth, celebrating that which gets us thru hard times, rejoicing in bonds of community, showing gratitude by giving back to those who we feel gifted by knowing.

It’s been seven years, pretty much to the day, that the tumult in Seattle happened. It’s been thirty-six years since that terrible summer of 1968, that year which marked many of us indelibly. The cells in my body have changed once over from Seattle, many times over since 1968. But what really has changed?

Today I’m thinking about violence, about the power of stories, about my love of ensemble reality, and about light returning. For every hope dashed, others spring up. Damn, I really am one fierce optimist.