7.23.2025

I borrowed a bicycle, a little small for me, the brakes weren't great, but I rode from Midtown through downtown Detroit and onto the Riverwalk and looked up at the Renaissance Center. The last time I'd been there was Election Night 2008. A group of us stayed in town for a couple days and just wandered around, drifted into bars, told people we'd worked on the campaign, let them buy us drinks. On Woodward I saw a squad of old sedans on stilts, whatever you call those, riding in a pack and I remembered the day after the election being in about that same place in the Pontiac Vibe I'd about lived in for several months, next to a guy in a black car jacked up like these were and he was blaring not music from his speakers but Obama's speech from the night before. It was an incredible time to be here and I thought I was going to stay. There was supposed to be a program for those of us who'd worked as organizers to take what we'd learned and work in cities like Detroit to help implement the administration's policies. To contribute, to try to keep that sense of community and optimism going. It was a nice idea and I was ready to commit to it. But then nothing happened and I went back to Chicago without much of a plan, as I sometimes do.