Archive for May 27, 2008
And so it begins
It’s Nora, perched on a bunk bed in an air conditioned quonset hut the likes of which we hadn’t seen in days. It’s sort of incredible, really, that the twelve of us seem to be getting along given that we’ve spent the last three days in 90 degree heat without any air conditioning whatsoever. We were talking earlier about how much air conditioning changed life in many parts of the world, brought people in off their porches and closed doors, divided neighbors. Was it worth it? Right now, my answer is a big emphatic YES.
But enough about air conditioning. There are much more important and less frivolous things to discuss.
We left New Orleans this morning, a tribe of women moving, building a movement as we move through the world. It was one of the most powerful moments I’ve ever experienced, knowing that we were bringing a dream to life, knowing that no matter what, the ride would change our lives and the lives of those we touched.
I feel so deeply, deeply grateful to all the people who made this trip possible, especially the crew in New Orleans without whom I don’t know what we would have done. The story of New Orleans is amazing, fantastic and absurd all at once. I was fortunate to meet a woman named Amy Marlow last summer when I passed through Delaware, and she made me pancakes and we decided to be friends even though we lived very far away from each other. She ended up in New Orleans, and when she heard I was coming there to start Wanderlust 2, she invited me to stay with her. Of course, I turned into twelve, and we turned the house into a chaotic mess of women and energy bars and bike parts for three days. Amy not only didn’t complain, she cooked for us, drove us around, and was generally more wonderful than I thought humanly possible.
Amy, of course, doesn’t exist in a vacuum, which meant that we also spent the weekend being treated to various and sundry bike repairs from Ric, our official Wanderlust mechanic without whom many of us would probably not be here today, Noah, who works at city health clinic and talked to us about the state of health care in New Orleans (in a word, atrocious), and Alli, who took us on a historical bike tour of the city on Sunday exploring the politics of Katrina, the recovery, economic justice, and New Orleans.
I know some of the riders will be able to share more eloquently than me about the experience of being in the Lower Ninth Ward where the levee breached, but I will say that it felt important to be there, to start our trip bearing witness to the ways in which the catastrophic failure of social, economic, educational, and environmental systems turns a force of nature into a natural disaster.
In many ways, Katrina was just a day in America writ large, a massive example of the kinds of small scale disasters that happen every day. And make no mistake about it, Katrina was massively devastating, and impacted the lives of millions of people in sudden and irrevocable ways. But it reminds me why of all the reasons to write and to ride, this one seems most important.
I ride for reproductive justice because it connects issues in way that is resonant with the lived experiences of people I’ve met, and it holds bodily autonomy as the central, critical nexus of our activism. Without being able to become a parent, express your sexuality, not become a parent, and have control over your body, it can be incredibly difficult to make decisions in other areas of life. And just as the politics of Katrina fell along racial and socio-economic lines, the heirarchy of decision making power in our society often falls along those same lines.
I ride to find out if those lines are fixed or mutable, and if we can use this trip to begin building a movement that encompasses a broad vision of what reproductive justice means.
Do you have specific things you’re interested in knowing more about the trip? Leave a comment, let us know, and look forward to many more posts from the intrepid Wanderlust crews about our daring adventures and explorations.
nola to louie and a full day of cycles
today was… OUR FIRST DAY OF RIDING!!!
a triumphant blast out of NOLA, a few intimidating bridges, countless dead animals carcasses on the side of the road, and all the bayou you can shake a stick (or maybe a bike flag) at.
it sure was a full day (60.1 miles by my cyclometer’s count, maybe a few less according to Google), and i, along with many others, have the tender quads and sun’s cruel markings to show for it. quite a few of us, despite consistently lathering up the sunblock, are feeling the heat now radiate off of our cherry-colored skin. c’e la vie, as they’d say in hospitaple new orleans.
now as we crash out in an air-conditioned tent provided by Mission on the Bay Christ Episcopal Church, i feel grateful for the comfortable pace with which we’ve eased into this trip. two and a half days in the crescent city allowed us to not only learn some things about the weather, culture, and history of this intense area, but also let us obviously get to know each other, and become a much more close-knit community than i would have thought possible in such a short period of time.
and the good feeling we share seems to be bouncing back from the people we’ve randomly met so far along the road. tonight we discussed how best to communicate our trip message and goals to those who flit in and out of our path, if only in three sentences. there are elements of not wishing to “scare” people off with pro-choice talk while still being honest. and truly, how to explain the complexity of a movement that is so new, and can encompass so much- a real human rights initiative. these ideas are constantly evolving, so lets just hope those with any interest keep checking back in with this blog (like the courteous firemen we met today)!
there is way too much i’d like to add right now, but my bunk bed is calling my name ever so invitingly. all i can say is i’m ready for the next adventure, and perhaps a few more traffic-filled bridges.
elisa
