forty years is forty years October 31, 2005
'Cause forty years is forty years And I was only fifteen then. -- Ferron -- Shadows on a Dime Amidst breakfast and anxiety about the rash of car break-ins/thefts yesterday I heard on WBUR that there was going to be a walk to Boston Common to commemorate a walk there forty years ago led by Martin Luther King. There was also an anti-war thing going on at the Common yesterday, so I guess it was a busy day. Anyway, back to the walk they were talking about: In April of 1965, Dr. King led a three-mile walk from Roxbury to a rally at Boston Common to protest de facto school segregation in Boston. For the longest time I have misremembered this event as having happened when I was 12. I was 14. Just turned 14 at the time. Forty years ago. I've written about this before, but forty years is forty years and I was only fourteen then -- to paraphrase the Ferron song I now have running around in my head alternatiing with If You Miss Me from the Back of the Bus. I had half a mind to chuck all the weekend plans and drive down to Washington to pay my respects to Rosa Parks. I had half a mind to blow off the book fair and go to both the anti-war thing and the anniversary walk. What mind caused me to carry on with previously made plans, I don't know. My gratitude to Rosa Parks is in my heart and will always be there. The profound impact of being on Boston Common 40 years ago is still imprinted in my soul. There's another song we used to sing in my youth : One man's hands can't tear a prison down Two men's hands can't tear a prison down But if two and two and fifty make a million We'll see that day come round We'll see that day come round. --Pete Seeger (I think)   So much has changed in 40 years and so much has yet to change. Some days I think nothing I do can possibly matter. I needed to be reminded that one person does make a difference because one person's actions have a ripple effect on two and two and fifty and the world changes. I've got to remember to be the change I wish to see in the world.		Today's Reading Neal Cassady Collected Letters: 1944-1967 by Neal Cassady,The Prophet of Dry Hill by David Gessner This Year's Reading 2005 Booklist
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