Giving Thanks

Story and photos by Pete Shaw

Last year I began this annual piece at the Portland Occupier with: “Another year with Covid in the air, and so another year where I was largely grounded due to health concerns. As well, as comes with age, there were health issues with which I had to deal. But as someone who makes a lot of lemonade, I am once again, with no reference to the horrific underpinnings of the holiday, thankful for much.” In describing the year since I wrote those lines, I would not change a word.

Once again, I was only able to cover one story over the past year. But on a personal level, it was a story I needed to cover. On May 12, about 35 people gathered on the corner of NE 6^th and Halsey, the now hallowed ground where 14 years earlier 25 year old Keaton Otis was murdered by the Portland police. Starting on June 12, 2010, Otis’s father, Fred Bryant, began holding a monthly vigil there in honor of his son and as a demand that police be held accountable. Not long after, the stress of Bryant’s mission contributed to his death, but the vigils have continued.

It remains one of the most beautiful examples of community I have ever known. It is grounded in something awful that no person should ever know, but which too many do. Many show up whose only connection to victims of police violence is an empathy with those who must carry on after losing loved ones to it, and to do their best to make sure that one day nobody will know this pain. In a word, it is beautiful.

This year’s memorial vigil took place on Mother’s Day, making it all the more poignant. Despite needing a cane to get around, and even then in great pain, I insisted on attending. My better 99%, who on nearly any other occasion would have nixed the idea, helped me into the car and helped me get around at the event. As usual, the crowd was friendly and welcoming, and the speeches were moving.

The art installation that recalls the all too common horror that happened here and has happened elsewhere, and as well informs a future where police will not terrorize people and communities, remains on schedule. Some of the people helping construct it were barely out of diapers when Keaton Otis was murdered. It was a beautiful and invigorating reminder of how we keep memory alive, how we take care of one another, and how doing so informs and swells all communities seeking a more just world.

Thank you to everybody who has shown up in some way to demand justice for the victims of police violence.

One year ago, Israel was ramping up its genocide of the Palestinian people. Protests in support of the Palestinians popped up across the country, as did apologists for genocide. The more liberal form of rationale was particularly galling, one which bought into the idea that the history of Palestine began on October 7 with Hamas’s attacks on Israel. The attacks were doubtless brutal, and they were acts of terror. But then what of Israel’s prior constant assaults on the Palestinian people? What of its stealing of Palestinian land? What of the daily humiliations and fears that the Palestinian people must endure? As one of my old Friends says, just look at the numbers of dead and then tell me who the real terrorists are.

Not long after Hamas’s attacks, I re-posted something about how if you are shocked about how Israel treats Palestinians, you should try reading some books about the history of the Indigenous people in this country. Someone I grew up with, a staunch supporter of Israel, suggested I am the one who needs to read more. I am always good with that idea, but I was left to wonder a few things. First, just what would I learn about how a colonizing Israel has treated the Palestinian people that would make me support Israel from reading about how the US treated the Indigenous people of this land? Also, I wondered, “Weren’t you the guy who when a few years ago I wondered why the go-to analog for how the Trump Administration was behaving awfully was Nazis when our own country’s history was replete with examples, such as Andrew Jackson’s treatment of the Cherokee people, replied by saying, ‘Maybe because we weren’t taught that in high school’?” We are approaching 55 years old. I was startled.

What followed by so many others I know, at various levels of apology for genocide, was a disturbing display of buying into Israel’s nonsensical propaganda that it does not target people or hospitals or pretty much anything save terrorists, a category that seemingly includes infants. In some cases, this included predictable insinuations of antisemitism. I have lost Friends over this, which to some degree I regret. But I have zero regrets in long ago finding the lesson to be learned from Germany’s attempted genocide of the Jewish people nearly a century ago was that genocide, no matter upon whom it is perpetrated, is Wrong. If that means losing Friends, so be it.

Of course, the Biden Administration which hemmed and hawed and vetoed four United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for a ceasefire, actively supported, and continues actively supporting, the destruction of the Palestinian people. Many of the bombs and missiles rendering children and other innocent people into hamburger are made in and sent from the United States. And when Kamala Harris campaigned for president after Biden dropped out, she could do no more than utter platitudes that amounted to, “It’s such a shame. Please pass the lemonade.” At the Democratic Party Convention, some of the Palestinian and Arab community in the United States asked to have one of theirs speak. They were denied.

For years to come the reasons for Kamala Harris’s loss to Donald Trump will be parsed. Certainly, there are no simple answers. But one of many that added up enough, say, to throw Michigan to Trump, was the anger at such subhuman treatment of the Palestinian people. When your relatives are getting slaughtered, “It’s such a shame” probably sounds a lot like, “Go fuck yourself.”

I voted for Harris, and I would do it again. But I can cast no blame on people who either chose not to vote or who voted for another candidate, including Trump, because they wanted to send a message to the Democratic Party. I think it was a bad tactic–and I say this as someone who believes you take the ten minutes or so to vote and then get back to doing the true lifeblood of even the flimsiest of democracies, organizing–but again if my niece had her skull cleaved in half by a sniper, I would probably feel different.

Predictably, a slice of whatever it is we call liberals is condemning these people and others who did not cast their ballots for Harris. They warn, I think correctly, of looming fascism. More accurately, they worry of a fascism that only now worries them because it appears at their door. As a person of Black and Indigenous descent who often calls in some of the KBOO 90.7 FM morning talks shows says, people like him have known about US fascism their whole lives, and a lot of white liberal sorts have not cared, at least in any material way. Not all, and he is clear to note that he does not blame them because he recognizes how powerful the US propaganda system is. But his point feels spot on, as is his always larger point: the best time to resist is Now.

Thank you to everyone who has stood up against and continues standing up against Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people, and the United States’s support of Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people. And thank you to everyone who continues standing up for the Palestinian people because genocide is always Wrong.

On more personal notes, by the time my brother and sister-in-law, John and Nancy, graced Portland with their presence in mid-August, I was walking much better, albeit with a cane. When they visited last year, I could barely get around. Not long after they arrived this time, we were gallivanting about Mt. Tabor. 

Forty years ago, in early October, my brother came Home from his freshman year of college on Fall Break. He brought with him Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited and The Band’s eponymous album. My aesthetic world was, excuse the pun, rocked. Dylan is the most important artist in my life, and The Band, after literally thousands of spins, still hits me in new ways. It is the most important work of art in my life. Following those artists, and the other artists they led me too–and all art–has made my life better, including most importantly as part of a gateway to and growing of some beautiful relationships. I am thankful for all of it.

Shortly after John and Nancy left, my old Friend Dave visited town, and on his last day I was able to walk, still with a cane, some of the Lower Macleay Trail with him. It was one of many life highlights to yack and laugh with him, and as usual, to talk about tennis. More recently, we have lamented Rafael Nadal’s retirement, but are also thankful at having had the opportunity to watch the professional career of so great a player. All you need to know about Nadal’s greatness is that for a few years, when he would go to work at the French Open, he passed a statue of himself.

As if these visits were not enough riches, Friends John and Sue whom we’ve not seen in about ten years came by.  The visit was too short, as are all visits from Friends.  But it was also as good as it gets, as are all visits from Friends.

These are among many Good and great people who make up my life, and who have been at my side through my health struggles. I am thankful for all of you.

In last year’s edition of our Giving Thanks article, I posted a photo of me, my cat Panayis, and Friend Kevin. Kevin had passed in early December, 2023. I still miss him, sometimes desperately. A world without him is a less comforting one. Every so often I think about taking a seat where he last sat on our back porch, with my guitar that he played on that gorgeous summer afternoon, and singing the last song of so many we had played together. But his absence still hurts, and I find a reason to do something else, including cry. On my better days when I think of him, I look out there, and if my eyes and ears are tuned to the right frequencies, I can see and hear us playing, “Love Minus Zero/No Limit,” and Kevin is full of joy, full of life. And for a moment, so am I.

I am most reminded of him, of the enduring bonds of Friendship, when I consider how many of my Friends have checked in on me about how I am doing, making sure my head is above the water. Thank you, all of you.

I am now the only living subject of that photo mentioned above. We had to put Panayis down in August. At 24, it was time, but it still hurt, and I still miss her. A few months earlier, we put down our calico cat, Pissfoot, and that pain too remains. Both of them were with me through some of my health struggles, and they were the last feline links to my deceased parents. I am thankful I had them in my life.

Through it all, my better 99%, Jessica, has been at my side. Her gentleness, caring, and compassion, just to pick three qualities, never fail to impress me. When I think of describing her, I am reminded of Keith Richards when asked to describe the power of music. After a short spell of thought, and a few starts and stops, he smiled, shook is head, and muttered, “Words.” To pull from three of my favorite songs, Jessica is my Blue Sky, my Waterloo Sunset, and after all this time, I’ve still never felt magic as crazy as this. She’s always there when I need her, and man, have I needed her this past year.

But let’s not end on a note that feels more than a touch melancholic. As I often say when it comes to these personal problems, No complaints. I consider myself an extremely lucky person by any standard.

And hell, I am now getting around without a cane. I will not be doing cartwheels or running any marathons, or even fifty yard dashes, anytime soon.

But today, Wednesday November 27, the New Seasons workers at 11 unionized Portland area stores are going out on a one day strike. Ava Robins, Co-Chair of the New Seasons Labor Union, cited management’s “unfair labor practices” and its refusal to offer “our members a deal that meets their needs.”  

We’ve heard this before, we’ve fought this before, and we’ve won this before. I plan to be out there covering it. I even have my better 99%’s approval, who trusts me to be safe with my health. And I will try and be there for as many struggles as I can over the next year.

I’d be thankful if you all joined me.