awake for it.

what i realized during the 18 days was that there was no one particular role i wanted or needed to play.  what i felt compelled to do was understand the revolution.  from as many sides as possible.  and by understand, i mean experience, get close to, get underneath, witness, live, breathe it.  and then be able to respond to what was happening in the moment it was happening.

which meant sometimes i was a protester with a scarf soaked in vinegar over my nose.

and sometimes i was a mama explaining to aza what was going on outside.

and sometimes i was a friend offering a drink and a smoke.

and sometimes i was a medic offering medicines and advice.

and sometimes i was a writer taking notes and hitting ‘publish’

and sometimes i was a photographer with a camera and a smile.

and sometimes i was a translator trying to relay impossible questions.

and sometimes i was the researcher/analyst reading about the history and the future of the region

and sometimes i was just tired or confused or overwhelmed or scared or cranky or insomniac.

but underneath it all, i kept hearing this little voice saying, just understand it.  just be in it.  so you can understand it.  pay attention.  pay attention.  keep waking up.

we have to keep waking up again and again.  its not a one time thing.  to be fully awake is a constant re-awakening from that half-sleep state of mind that we lapse into like a habit.  that state where we stop paying attention and instead get all lost in our heads in fantasies about the past and the future and the not here and not now.  and then we catch ourselves and we wake back up.

this is the internal revolution, to wake back up fully.  during an external revolution.  and both of these revolutions, the personal and the political, are constantly being refreshed.  we fall into half-sleep state.  we fall into social complacency and oppressions.  and then we revolt.

to fully awakenedness for a moment.

and then we just do what needs to be done.