Jacobin, Issue 20 (Winter 2016) Up From Liberalism

Revolution (ANIAPPT story)

When we were young we used to spin around and around and around and, you get it, arms spread wide and heads tilted back a little, we would then stop and close our eyes and stagger around our backyard, drunk with our ability to move.

In our tweens, would go into our above-ground pool, and, hugging the aluminum sides, would walk around and around, Counterclockwise, pushing the water ahead of us, creating a whirlpool, or so we called it. When the water had a volition of its own, when it could keep going without our meager encouragement, we would turn and swim against it, floundering, flung backwards into the flow of the water, swept along the current we ourselves had created.

These are not metaphors. They are things I did. Now, each day I drive my son around at night to help him get sleepy. We drive the same route each night, out by the horse farm along country roads and back to our house thru town, tonight's ride done, tomorrow's waiting in the future.