I'm
not following Tom Morello around the country. It might seem that way;
in the past few months I've caught him at South by Southwest in
Texas, and a few weeks ago for May Day in New York City, where the Rage legacy
and Occupy icon organized a GUITARMY to stomp some blacktop swinging axes. But while Morello will indeed be in Chicago
today, kicking for tens of thousands in Daley Plaza, his street-side
spectacular is hardly the main selling point for my trek to the
Windy.
I'm
here because the NATO protests are . . . hold on a minute – did I
tell you how I fucking got here? I took a
nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine hour bus trip from Boston with a fleet
of Occupiers. Some of my travel mates I've been covering for months.
Others I've just met in the past few weeks. But until yesterday, I'd never smelled any of their feet, or
shared with them a microscopic toilet facility with echo-friendly
walls that play farts like trampolines do basketballs.
My
plan was to skip NATO. I expected more than a massive showing, but
funds have been low, and there's no Fung Wah to Chicago. Or so I
thought before seeing that NATO-bound Occupy buses were departing
from the Hub. With that my sentiment shifted, and so I filled out the
online form and hoped that organizers would approve of a reporter
tagging along. At best, I envisioned a literal boys-on-the-bus
experience. At worst, I'd get to Chicago for the small cost of
however many cigarettes Occupiers bummed off me at rest stops.
The
result was somewhere in between those poles, with at least one cool
Juggalo who smoked me out on some totally legal K2 synthetics, which
it turns out I'm a huge fan of. Things started off rocky; the buses
were two hours late, and one of them shit the futon less than 30
miles out of Boston. But after that it was an absolute dream complete
with harmonicas, guitars, and Chris, the endlessly fascinating and
perpetually shirtless pacifist MMA fighter who sat next to me when he
wasn't parading through the aisle dropping knowledge.
It
really was a whirl. I'm not sure how the Complaining About Free Shit
working group felt about the bus, which came courtesy of National
Nurses United, but I full engaged the road show. When I felt like
resting, I rested. When I felt like reading, I read. Otherwise, when
I felt like being entertained, I just listened, and got two ears
filled with everything from credible conspiracy theories to at
least one comparison of the situation to Christ's expedition in the
wilderness.
In
short I had a great time reading, writing, and interviewing Occupiers
whose personal stories add up to the reason that more than 50,000
people are heading to Chicago this week. I was hardly even fazed when
some movement members who were not on the bus started flaming me on
Twitter for mooching off of Occupy resources, which I'd actually feel
badly about if there weren't empty seats. They also
accused me of sacrificing whatever little bit of objectivity I had
left in covering Occupy by riding along.
That's
completely understandable, or at least it was until I touched down in
Chicago and got the briefing for independent journos who are covering
NATO. Reliable word is that police aren't distinguishing between
reporters and protesters, writers and anarchists – we're all
subject to the military-grade aggression that's already being thrust
upon folks who are courageous enough to stand up to war profiteers
and murderers. At least in that regard, I'd argue that we're all on
the same bus after all.
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