Occupy Main Street
By Danny Mayer
“Don’t be fooled by the complaints that the Occupy Wall Street movement hasn’t got a clear set of demands. Everybody in a position of power knows exactly what the people want. They simply don’t want to acknowledge it. Because, one issue at a time, the demands all boil down to one thing: we don’t want you running the world any more. You’re bad at it. The future you imagine is a vision of hell. If I were in charge, I wouldn’t want to acknowledge that, either.”
—Ben Tripp, “What are your demands?”
The day before it came to Lexington, the Wednesday the Herald-Leader ran a feature piece touting the new Tiffany Jewelry Plant as a “’super-duper’ addition to city,” September 28, 2011,the first trail I cut into the Occupy Main Street protest comes from the west and the south. I ferry across an 8:00 A.M. traffic jam along Vine at Rupp Arena, cut through the parking lot, eddy south and then west around the homeless encampment cut into the honeysuckle understory lining DeRoode, and then whomp it to City Hall sitting chilled in the early-morning shadow of the JP Morgan Chase Building for a meeting with Councilmember Steve Kay over public funding of the proposed Rupp Arena Entertainment District.
The next day, An hour before its noon Thursday start, I come in from the north under a late morning sun, traveling against traffic on Limestone and then against traffic again, turning east onto Main and through the JP Morgan Chase Bank Plaza, where between 6 and 10 police officers circulate in small groups under the cautious surveillance of a couple circling bike scouts. Later that night walking home from BCTC, I will approach it from the south and east, cutting across UK’s campus and up Rose to Main Street, now walking with traffic, and cross at the Kentucky Theater to make first contact: two humans and a bunch of signs.
The pathways start to pile on top of each other, angular vectors all leading to and from the same place. 3:00 A.M. Day 1, leaving Occupy Main Street and making an excited beeline four blocks straight up MLK for home. 5:18 P.M. Day Four, leaving south from home for a General Assembly, down Limestone against traffic, left at the courthouse and upon the encampment’s backside, Esplanade, Jim Embry manning the flank with a sign reading Jobs! Jobs! Jobs! By day five, on paper things begin to resemble a giant squid. My great tentacled circuits flail about the city, plug into a body that wraps around an entire city block in downtown Lexington, and funnel back out with the speed and force common to all newly tapped energy sources.
Coming into camp, you notice different things. Your tarp is now in use, thrown over benches for a make-shift sleeping room; the food has been organized; a sign station appears; General Assembly meetings grow from 20 to 30 to 60 strong. A candidate for state governor shows up. Curly fro’d John offers website creation. Tyler, a sustainable ag student at UK, helps teaching non-verbal consensus decision-making. Bob, a homeless man in his fifties originally from Massachusetts, starts spending the night regularly.
It is a slow growth, a hardening off amidst millions of tiny fall blooms. Ramona, a graduate of the BCTC Film Certificate program, begins filming interviews on day one, editing and then posting them to youtube. Steve from Somerset photographs and photographs and photographs the early establishment of the station camp. His pictures capture several great shots of Mike, a migrant organic farmworker on his way to a farm in Michigan who provides an early burst of romantic inspiring energy. Judy drops into General Assembly, a white woman in her 50s who says she’s being harassed by a big bank, lingers for a while before drifting down Main. Karen establishes guidelines for dealing with drunks who fuck with the occupiers on weekends. Jim and Freddie and Tonya work to diversity the movement’s color. Harold—blue slacks, jacket, big hillbilly beard—sees the action while driving by, parks his vehicle, and joins.
I am just one moving part, a journalist/participant drifting by on the fall tides, but by now this much should be clear. Something is happening here in Lexington, KY, at the foot of the JP Morgan Chase Bank.
General Assemblies nightly at 6:30 PM. It’s a 24/7 occupation, so you are always welcome. There is no bad time. Main Street at the corner of MLK: JP Morgan Chase.
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