DFL precinct caucuses: out in the cold?

We officially had a January thaw yesterday and it’s continuing today. The Twin Cities office of the National Weather Service Tweeted this midday yesterday:

At 1:45PM today, MSP Airport surpassed 32 degrees. This is the first time since December 27th in which we have seen a temp greater than 32 at MSP.

In other words, 365 hours and 26 minutes of freezing or below temperatures.

Today we’re being put on notice about Friday’s snow potential. Sigh!

We used the brief interlude of warmer than average temperatures to take down the icicle lights on the garage. It wasn’t quite luxuriating, but it was a nice taste of spring days to come. We actually did see a few signs of snow melting late in the afternoon. The dogs have been giddy at the less than frigid temperatures.

Meanwhile, COVID cases continue to spike in Minnesota and nationally and the Democratic-Farmer-Labor party caucuses are scheduled for February 1. I checked the local DFL’s web site and FB page (neither of which appear to have been updated for several months) and it looks as though our district caucus is still planned to be in person, despite the fact that I’ve received several emails inviting me to learn how to caucus online. It’s unclear whether the issue stems from a lack of consideration of public health concerns, a lack of timely communications, both, or some other combination. Remember Will Rogers entirely too apt quote “I belong to no organized party. I'm a Democrat.” 

I have no intention of participating in a face to face caucus in several weeks. I’m irritated that it’s not easier to track what’s going on with DFL caucuses, and am anxious and frustrated by the ability of Republicans to thwart action in the US Senate on voting rights legislation and the Biden administration’s continuing inability to better organize and communicate essential messages and supply chains regarding the now two year old pandemic.

women’s voting rights at one hundred (but who’s counting?) 

Evie Shockley

eenie meenie minie moe
catch a voter by her toe
if she hollers then you know
got yourself a real jane crow

* * *

one vote is an opinion
with a quiet legal force ::
a barely audible beep
in the local traffic, & just
a plashless drop of mercury
in the national thermometer.
but a collectivity of votes
/a flock of votes, a pride of votes,
a murder of votes/ can really
make some noise. 

* * *

one vote begets another
if you make a habit of it.
my mother started taking me
to the polls with her when i
was seven :: small, thrilled
to step in the booth, pull
the drab curtain hush-shut
behind us, & flip the levers
beside each name she pointed
to, the Xs clicking into view.
there, she called the shots.

* * *

rich gal, poor gal
hired girl, thief
teacher, journalist
vote your grief 

* * *

one vote’s as good as another
:: still, in 1913, illinois’s gentle
suffragists, hearing southern
women would resent spotting
mrs. ida b. wells-barnett amidst
whites marchers, gently kicked
their sister to the curb. but when
the march kicked off, ida got
right into formation, as planned.
the tribune’s photo showed
her present & accounted for.

* * *

one vote can be hard to keep
an eye on :: but several /a
colony of votes/ can’t scuttle
away unnoticed so easily. my
mother, veteran registrar for
our majority black election
district, once found—after
much searching—two bags
of ballots /a litter of votes/
stuffed in a janitorial closet.

* * *

one-mississippi
two-mississippis 

* * *

one vote was all fannie lou
hamer wanted. in 1962, when
her constitutional right was
over forty years old, she tried
to register. all she got for her
trouble was literacy tested, poll
taxed, fired, evicted, & shot
at. a year of grassroots activism
nearly planted her mississippi
freedom democratic party
in the national convention.

* * *

one vote per eligible voter
was all stacey abrams needed.
she nearly won the georgia
governor’s race in 2018 :: lost by
50,000 /an unkindness of votes/
to the man whose job was purg
maintaining the voter rolls.
days later, she rolled out plans
for getting voters a fair fight.
it’s been two years—& counting.

********************************************
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