Well, HELLOOOOO! Sorry, inside joke.
Isn’t human nature cool? I love how you can end up spending every moment of a week with complete strangers and become BFF’s for life! You meet a group of people, barely remembering their names from the introduction and the following night, you and this new crew are arguing about where you should go to dinner. You end up doing everything with this group. You eat together, you wait together, you drink together, you get ready together, you wake up together, you suffer through hangovers together, and you coordinate your entire week around people you didn’t know the Sunday before! You experience life that week like you’ve known each other for years! Those experiences create a lifelong bond, a tie, created by those inside jokes that come from the stories you share. Years from now, I’ll be able to look at Erin, Alaina, or Rico and say, “Well, Hellooooo”, and they will know exactly what I am talking about.
The common experience the four of us shared was the Democratic National Convention in Denver, CO. The DNC has always been on my bucket list. I looked at the dynamics of this convention, the historic implication, and the opportunity I had in front of me and dove right in! That’s always been my approach; I just seem to be more aware of it lately. Life is too short to wait “until the next time.” I don’t have a deep, “things I want to do or accomplish list,” but I am determined to follow up on the things that I put on that list. This week I confirmed a spot to attend a Michigan Notre Dame game in South Bend the next time that game is played.
The convention took place in Denver of course and I have to say I wasn’t very thrilled with my experience with Denver. I can’t explain exactly what it is but there is something missing in Denver, or it may be that the city tries very hard to have this predetermined identity, assigned when the city was set up. Jon Steward nailed it on the last night he broad
casted the Daily Show from Denver:
“We’ve learned something about Denver. There is absolutely no middle ground. You are either a rapture waiting promise keeper, or you drive a car that runs on gorp. That’s it!”
I lived in Denver for almost a year, four years ago and that is exactly it! There is no middle ground. It’s like this weird word association game: organic food + yoga + Skiing + LL Bean = Denver. If you’re not into whatever the latest hip
stuff white people like (great blog!) then you don’t fit in Denver. I wasn’t a big fan of the place when I lived there, and the week in Denver did nothing to improve my opinion of the city.
It was ABSOLTULY clear that the city didn’t want us there in the first place! Like a bunch of mayors got together to select the next DNC city and the mayor from Denver picked the short straw. People were unfriendly. They never talked to you unless you started the conversation and even then, it wasn’t very engaging, like they were answering questions sitting I a witness stand. It was yes or no answers, completely avoiding eye contact as they talked to you. Are we sure Denver was the right city to host a bunch of hippy liberal Democrats? There are at least two examples of walking into a bar at 1:00 AM asking for a drink and getting shut down, “we’re closed, and it doesn’t matter if we’re allowed to serve drinks until 2:00.” At least do it with a smile on your face. Don’t look like you CAN’T WAIT to get us out of there!
It was also very clear that since they didn’t want us there in the first place, it was completely acceptable to gouge our eyes out and take every last penny we brought with us! I think they must have thought we were the other party. Everything had NYC prices. Bottles of water were going for $4 in some places. Restaurants must have put together a special “convention only” menu! Cab rides were the price of Greyhound Bus tickets. There was no shame in it either. They just didn’t care.
It felt like all people in Denver talked about was hiking, running, and all their “groovy” adventures in the mountains. They compare the best places to buy their organic strawberries and talk about how they don’t eat bread unless it contains 34 varieties of oats and grains. Like nothing else in the world is wrong! Ask them about world events and they act, as they have no idea why you would bring up such unhappy topics.
The show the Denver law enforcement community put on was something else! I was very impressed with the performance. Now if only we would arm our troops in Iraq in the same manner, we would have “won” that war three years ago! There were hundreds of cops in full riot gear scattered all over the city. They all looked like Robocops (please tell me you know that reference). Many of the Robocops were seen sitting on corners, resting their space aged gloves on loaded M-16’s. The Robocops had hundreds of those blue plastic handcuffs attached to their belts. They even had Robohorses, I kid you not, decked out in full riot gear! The Robohorses trotted through the city in face gear and shin protectors! Why a horse needs a facemask or shin protectors is beyond me. More importantly, where the hell do they make horse riot gear? I want to visit that factory! How do they test that equipment? It made me nervous t
o see the Robocops and Robohorses all geared up and I guess that was the point. However, when you have that much gear on and no party to go to, you tend to make your own party and as the days passed, I worried that something bad was going to happen. It felt like all it would take was one 20-year-old idiot to call a Robocop a pig. Luckily no one attending the convention gave them a reason to; at least I didn’t hear any stories.
I do have to say that I think the city got it all wrong. We weren’t there to make trouble. We were there to celebrate a historic event. Besides, when was the last time any American group had a good protest? Come on! We valet our cars at the mall and complain that the Gap is too far from the entrance. We’re not dealing with mace!
The biggest protest we saw was the bike protester gang. Yes, a bunch of kids on bikes riding through the city screaming at cars something inaudible. I think they were either complaining about gas prices or people who drive SUV’s (for a non oil producing nation, we pay the lowest price in the world) or they were protesting against driving unwashed cars. Since it was Denver, I’m going to go with the latter. Of course I could be completely wrong and it could have just been that biker gang from Better Off Dead, still looking for their two dollars.
We just don’t do protests like we used. I miss a good sit-in and tear gas adventure! Besides, we’ve made it impossible for people to protest anyway. If you wanted to protest at the DNC, you had to do it in the “Free Speech Zone.” OK you can stop laughing, I’m serious. If you had something to say, you had to do it in the Free Speech Zone, which was located in what felt like 60 miles from downtown Denver.
“Free Speech Zones (also known as First Amendment Zones, Free speech cages, and Protest zones) are areas set aside in public places for political activists to exercise their right of free speech in the United States. The stated purpose of free speech zones is to protect the safety of those attending the political gathering, or for the safety of the protesters themselves. Critics, however, suggest that such zones are "Orwellian", and that authorities use them in a heavy-handed manner to censor protesters by putting them literally out of sight of the mass media, hence the public, as well as visiting dignitaries. Though authorities generally deny specifically targeting protesters, on a number of occasions, these denials have been contradicted by subsequent court testimony. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed, with various degrees of success and failure, a number of lawsuits on the issue. The most prominent examples are those created by the United States Secret Service for President George W. Bush and other members of his administration. Free speech zones existed in limited forms prior to the Presidency of George W. Bush; it has been during Bush's presidency that their scope has been greatly expanded.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_speech_zones).
Overall the convention itself could only be described as electric and energetic. There was a buzz all week, day and night. Everywhere you went you would find hugging, laughing, singing, dancing, and just pure happiness; pure joy flowing through those attending the convention.
People were selling everything you can imagine. You found everything form the standard convention gear like bumper stickers, campaign buttons, and T-shirts, to the not so standard Obama action figure and Hilary blow up dolls. My favorite trinket was free. It came from one of the local art galleries (and one of the coolest) that sell Dr. Seuss art prints: “Dr. Seuss For President.” I wore that button with pride!
The event of the day on Monday was the DCCC party. Congressman grandpa Harry Mitchell invited me to the party. In what was one of the highlights of the week, Harry Mitchell had to come downstairs and talk the security team into letting me “into the party.” That’s right boys and girls; Harry Mitchell used his “juice” to get me into the club! It was exactly the scene repeated every weekend in front of the coolest clubs in Vegas, “yo, Bobby, can you let that guy in, he’s with me.” As I’m going up the escalator to the party on the second floor, I hear James Taylor playing from the speakers. I’m thinking, “Oh boy, what kind of party is this.” I mingle and introduce myself to various people hanging out with Congressman Mitchell, and out of the corner of my eye, I catch someone on the stage. It takes me a moment before I realize that James Taylor is actually SINGING on the stage! A few minutes later, Tony Bennett walks on stage, and does a set, including a cool version of “I left my heart in San Francisco.” That’s what I call a party.
Tuesday was the day I went to the Pepsi Center to see the actual convention. As I walked in, I was immediately swept by the energy and vibe. It was the most amazing buzz I had ever felt (and I was at this year’s Super Bowl). The place was just on fire. It was loud! The noise was from thousands of people just talking over each other. They couldn’t help it. It was like all these people spent the afternoon doing dozens of espresso shots! There were smiles, and hugs, and the diversity in the place made me feel like I was riding on the One Train at 6:00 PM in the middle of New York City. I paid particular attention to the older black delegates from the southern states. As you might expect, they were floating on air. I’m sure they had always held out hope for a week like this, but I’m sure they never thought they’d see it in their lifetime. It was clear they were soaking it all in. They had finally seen the reward to all those years of work and sacrifice. Nothing would ruin how they felt.
What did we do Tuesday night? Well, nothing really. You know, silly things like hanging out Charles Barkley, dancing on the roof of a club to a live performance from Biz Markie and Eric B, and doing shots with the Nevada Delegation. Nothing too exciting… I have no idea where this club was and if you told me my kids were being held hostage there, I wouldn’t be able to find it…oh, wait! It’s across the street from an Arby’s, which by the way, NEEDS to be open at 1:30 in the morning! When else would you eat there?
Wednesday we skipped the convention festivities and watched the speeches from the Maryland party at another bar I couldn’t identify. I have to admit; no one parties like the representatives of the great state of Maryland! I tried to talk to Jesse Jackson but he would have nothing to do with me. I wanted to tell him that the SNL skit of him doing Green Eggs and Ham is one of the best shticks of all time! I cry every time I see it! I guess he wasn’t interested in the feedback.
Thursday, well Thursday was why we were all there. I’m not going to try and describe Thursday and the Obama speech. I’m just not that good of a writer and I won’t do it justice. It’s enough to say that the experience left me speechless. No matter what happens in this election or who you support, we all have to admit that it was a historic event and one all of us there will remember for as long as we live.
Overall, the whole week was one giant (don’t want to say party) celebration! There was this sense of brotherhood and (don’t say it) hope. We were all there for the same reason. We’re not big fans of the direction this country has been on over the last eight years and we were all there to commit to take action to change it. There was a sense of purpose and mission. I was energized and inspired. I had the best 20 conversations I’ve had in a long time with complete random people. I met people who were full of pride and passion. It wasn’t about fear or hate or control. It was about the future, the potential, and the possibilities.
It was about Scott Goldman (yea, another inside joke…)
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