AxBlog

organized by ADAPT, monday, tuesday, and possibly the rest of the week, there is a decent-sized group of people, most of them handicapped or disabled (same difference?), protesting at the state capitol and surrounding streets (which is a block from where i work) attempting to get a meeting w/ the governor about $$$ going towards nursing home care vs. in home care.  now, i really don’t know much about the details about this issue, if money is really going where it is said to be going by bredesen or by the protesters, etc. but i wandered over there yesterday after work since i had my camera w/ and to see if i could get any pictures for whatever reason.  i was surprised how much i teared up when i first got over there… i probably spent about 15-20 minutes at the top of a wide stretch of stairs that lead to a sidewalk on the street in front of the capitol and just kind of watched people. there were about 10? 12? guards up on the capitol looking down at everyone on the sidewalk and in the street. while i was at the top of the stairs, about 10 more guards came up and stood at the base of the steps. as one lady pointed out (while laughing and pointing), it was brilliant to put guards up at the foot of the steps to keep all of the handicapped people from escaping in that direction. the funniest thing was that there is a wheelchair ramp just to the side of the steps, and no guards were initially standing at it. which lead to a man in his motorized wheelchair booking it down the ramp and across the legislative plaza, w/ two guards chasing him… the guards gave up and “let” him go :)  so, after i made it through the 20 questions w/ one of the guards (where are you going? where’s your car? what are you doing here? whats your favorite color? blah blah blah) i was allowed to leave. yay me.