The world has a nemesis.
Well, if not the world, then at least the country. And I don't mean my own personal nemesis. While I have been mentioned on their website, I know that I'm not awesome enough to be, you know, a personal adversary. No, no, this is a nemesis all of us need to keep an eye on.
They're called Kansas Kountry Khurch.
And they go around the country, picketing the funerals of gay people and soldiers. They protest outside the Holocaust Museum and Jewish cultural centers. They make the little kids in their church hold up signs with awful slurs and hate speech. And then they support their church by yelling the ugliest things possible at people, trying to provoke them into an altercation so that they can sue them afterwards.
Yeah, you know who I'm talking about.
Anyway, the Kansas Kountry Khurch decided that they needed to visit Rust City last week. To protest a high school. Because Rust City High is apparently "infested" with The Gays and People Who Believe in Evolution and People Who Hate God and typical yackety-schmackety. This is what they do. All of us should find this morally reprehensible.
(And a little P.S. here. When I was down in South Central, and the Kansas Kountry Khurch came to protest a play I was directing there, there were people in town who actually said they supported the Kansas Kountry Khurch. I am not even kidding.)
And not that I should be surprised by any of the low blows that this organization would stoop to, but dude, this is a high school. That means that these are kids that they're picketing. They were coming to Rust City to throw hate in the faces of a bunch of kids.
That's so gross.
So a bunch of my performance students--totally on their own--get super excited to make a performance as a kind of counter-protest. To make a stand against hate, you know. And they want me to help. So we have meetings outside of class and lots of excitement and creativity and la la la, and they decided on this carnival-booth kind of idea where people ask the visitors questions like what they like about themselves, what they find beautiful, what they think is important. And the visitor writes her answer on a colored balloon that they then tie onto this car, and eventually the car gets more and more and more balloons tied onto it, with all these little cryptic messages of love and acceptance, little statements of individuality. So over the course of this performance, the car just got bigger and brighter and fluffier with all these balloons floating up and up, all over this car.
And there was no encouragement needed to get people participating. No invitation needed. Other counter-protesters just jumped right in as soon as the car showed up. And kids from the high school came right over after the last bell and lept right into the middle of it, and everyone was so, so happy. I mean, they were celebrating. For real celebrating. It's the kind of thing I imagine the Fourth of July is supposed to be but never is. People were cheering and cars were honking support and a radio station came and blasted music for us, and everyone was dancing in the street and talking to each other and taking pictures of each other's signs. People brought dogs and kids and friends.
And here's the deal: it was genuine. Everyone was grinning from ear to ear while almost crying at the same time. Because it was this perfect moment, you know? This actual moment of Love Thy Neighbor. But it was real, though. Not all this hypocritical crap of helping people out and then complaining what a pain in the ass it is, or the "love the sinner, not the sin" lie that is just a big excuse to judge people. (Uhhhh...I went to a fundamentalist Baptist day camp for years as a small child. Shhhh.) Because there was no judgement. There were no sinners. There were no religious divisions or any of that arbitrary junk people use to establish superiority over each other. There were just people. People in all their joy and strength and beautiful difference. Like neighbors. A community.
Feelings of community, when they happen, really get to me, since I've only ever had brief glimpses into being part of a community. Like when my union went on strike--see, here's a little peek of what it's like to be part of a community. Or the very first Passover Seder I went to. I mean, even the Genius Patrol was more of a collective, rather than a community. So when it happens, it's overwhelming and...transcendent, maybe? Me being me, you know--living in a world of heroes and villains and unsuspecting civilians and extraordinary powers and plots to take over or save the world--I don't have much use for religion. I don't believe in a god because I don't feel it in my soul. And because I don't really see any evidence of one. And I like evidence. But those fleeting moments of community...I bet that's the kind of thing people are talking about when people talk about "god".
This doesn't happen a lot. But it happens sometimes.
And looking at everyone at this event, you know--but especially the high schoolers--makes me think that maybe it's little moments like this that really can help make some kind of a difference. Maybe it's little events like this balloon car that can make SuperHeroes obsolete. You know, if you have these small moments of celebration in your early years, these couple of hours here and there where you dance in the street and talk to strangers and tell each other what you love and let them share what you fear...well, then maybe there's no need to develop SuperPowers. Because you already know that there are other people out there who will help you survive. There's no need to let yourself fracture into separate identities born out of calamity or necessity or blood. Because you've already had little moments of confirmation that your regular identity is enough as it is.
Then you can step outside your door each day without a different face in your back pocket for emergencies. You can have the courage to face the world utterly, wonderfully whole.
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