My March: Just a tiny step toward the change.

So, sometimes we decide to do the right thing for the wrong reasons, but along the way, we realize how significant our actions are, and we realize how much more we need to do.

It's been a few weeks now, and I haven't been able to fully encapsulate my Women's March on Washington experience. I think that I have been processing, and I think that I have been completely overwhelmed by the bombardment of what we are seeing from the Trump administration. I admit, I am still having trouble referring to him as our "new president." I'm not in denial. I know what happened.

I have been disappointed in election outcomes before, but this is different. This is not a Democrat versus Republican response for me. I still believe that a Donald Trump presidency transcends the two-party system in a way that I can only describe as a nightmare. His campaign, and his continued rhetoric and actions have brought out the worse demons of our nation. It has given our ugly underbelly the opportunity to roll over like a dog to be scratched.

When the thought occurred to me that I wanted to go to the Women's March on Washington, it was for myself. I wanted to be able to say I was there. I wanted to see the process of my own feelings of loss come to some kind of conclusion. And like so many other "events," I bought the sweatshirt, I made the pink hat, and I brought my camera--because that's what you do.

I am a terrible activist, and my original reasons for going weren't completely pure. I got on a bus with 53 other Arkansans, and awaited my internal shift. It was a long day on the road. I know that my true self rises to the surface when I become completely exhausted. About an hour before we reached our hotel in Roanoke, Virginia, the tears just started to flow. I wasn't thinking about crying, but suddenly, I was. The profound weight of how our country had changed, and how we had become something I didn't recognize hit me like a ton of bricks (all over again).

We had gone from a nation of hope and potential, to a nation of cynicism and distrust.

It was late at night, and I didn't want to disrupt others around me with my emotional release. I swallowed hard, and pushed down the need to snot-sob. I had to get on with it.

We arrived in D.C., and what I saw was beyond anything I could have anticipated. Small groups gathered, and we suddenly became a sea of people. I could not see the end of it.

Of course, there were celebrity speakers. It goes without saying that some people are attracted by events when celebrities turn up. But it wasn't Ashley Judd or Madonna that got to me. It was little Sophie Cruz, Donna Hylton and the Mothers of the Movement who really got into my heart.

Sophie Cruz was born in America in 2010 to parents who came here illegally. She now has fears that she and her family will be separated and that her parents are deported. She's just a few years older than my little girl. Her maturity and clarity on family values and America's history as a nation of immigrants is astounding. Donna Hylton served time in prison for murder. There is no way to sugar-coat her crimes. But she raised so much awareness in me about the treatment of black women by our criminal justice system, that while I cannot reconcile her past, I can identify with the feeling of inequity and opportunistic nature of those who hold power over any woman. And as a mother, hearing other mothers speak about the tragic loss of their children as a result of our criminal justice system allowing an undercurrent of racism, stereotyping and profiling to persist, their words were like a key in a lock for me. I already recognized the inequity with which blacks and whites are treated within the criminal and judicial systems, but these women live with the pain of that inequity every single minute of every single day. That pain will last forever.

In efforts to make the Women's March more inclusive, speakers from many different groups were invited to share their vision for moving forward. We literally stood within a throng of people for hours as speakers shared their stories, and their calls to action. Many of us had never been to a protest or a march in our lives. After a while, standing in place becomes very uncomfortable. You need to move. It's actually painful to stand still for that long.

And that is when I had my activist epiphany: Imagine standing in place forever. Imagine what it feels like to keep fighting for the same rights forever. Imagine what it feels like to experience the same discrimination, pain and inequity forever. Imagine the pain of standing still in someone else's shoes forever.

I am a white middle class woman. I am comfortable. I only have a few personal worries. I have always been politically vocal, but I have not been politically "active." And there is a huge difference between words and actions.

My favorite sign from all of the marches.

I think many of us who marched can say that. The group of marchers I rode along with was very eclectic. We had women of all ages and backgrounds, a couple of men, children, and members of the LGBTQ community. When I think about what those of us with privilege have failed to do, I try to consider where we have come from socially. I am not seeking to excuse us or ask for forgiveness, I am seeking to understand myself and others like me who are passionate about the rights of others, but who have not done enough. Is it possible that those of us from the older generation mistakenly believed that in winning the fight against segregation, and finally electing a black president that the fight was over? Is it possible those of us from my generation simply didn't have the kind of exposure to the realities of race, and we only thought the issues still survived in outlying pockets of our nation?

I don't know the answers.

I have some really great friends in the black community, and I credit them for helping me learn a lot--especially over the last election cycle, and as our worst nightmares have come true.

One of them is the woman my daughter refers to as "the hair lady." She moved here from California, and we talk about race a lot when she is making me look amazing. Even she didn't understand the level of racism that still exists in America until she moved to the South. When we talked just a few days ago, we both agreed that we had known things weren't perfect where equality issues were concerned, but we thought we were heading in the right direction. We didn't believe that we were literally going to start going backwards.

Another dear friend shares so much in our American history about which many of us living in privilege have not been aware. My sweet-hearted friend lives with a fire about her people that I never witnessed or knew about when we worked together. I am grateful to her for helping me understand more about the Electoral College, and some of the ways the seeds of racism so successfully took hold among working class whites, poor whites and people of color.

I stood in a throng of people who truly want to be the change. But as uncomfortable as it was to stand in place for so long, I have never truly suffered for any cause. In a seventy-two-hour period of time, I traveled from Northwest Arkansas to Washington, D.C., and back. Space was cramped. It was hard to sleep. There was a lot of gas-station junk food along the way. But none of that compares to anything that my friends have endured. And none of that compares to what so many Americans without privilege have faced, and continue to face everyday.

So, at the end of the day, why did this white, middle class, stay at home mom march? I marched because it was the beginning of acknowledging all that I have not done, and all that those of us who truly care must do.

Just after the election, fears about my family and our future were raised. For the first time, I felt concerned that sharing my views on social media and with others would lead my family to come to harm. At that moment, the definition of that harm was social alienation, or maybe financial impact.

After standing in a massive crowd for a couple of hours, listening to people talk about real harm and real fear, I think I better understand what it means to suffer, and that I absolutely haven't done it. I knew I was fortunate. I knew that that the playing field was not even. But I thought knowing that was enough. I thought recognition and relation was enough.

But even though I am not a great activist, I know that as long as the rights of people of color, women, people of different faiths, members of the LGBTQ community, and our environment are under threat, I have not done enough.

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