So it starts to become a thing when the guy says, to his friends, “Did you go down to Wall Street yet? I wanted to go down and see what it was all about, so I could laugh at it”

Dan and I exchanged glances and smirks.
I went back to reading the article on my phone.

The quieter kid by the window was trying to disagree but mostly by brushing the loud guy off. The loud guy was in front of them, turned around on the seat like on the bus in elementary school. And he was saying the occupiers are just lazy and they don’t have jobs – you can’t have a job if you sleep there and stay there 24/7, duh. They’re just lazy and are complaining and not doing anything. I wanted to intervene, because as he was talking I read a tweet that refuted this – 74% of occupiers are employed, but about half of tea partiers aren’t. I said out loud “I want to engage!” to Dan. This guy talked about how he wished he had gone down and told the occupiers all this – because it’d be more decent to tell them to “their face” instead of saying it “behind their back” ya know? As if he was the first guy to say these things and he should go down there so they knew how he felt about it, because it was just that profound. Which, of course, it was. Or rather, it became.

His next line was “I don’t want my tax dollars going toward shoveling three pounds of shit out of that park!” I was confused at first, and so was the kid by the window. I thought he was referring to the raid that happened a few nights ago – since a lot of personal property was thrown out and ostensibly that removal was paid for by the city, with taxpayer money. But of course – that would be a valid claim. IMHO, the wasted tax dollars are on the police force (police brutality) and the midnight raids and riot gear and pepper spray and desecration of the encampment. Windowkid was confused too – “Three pounds? of shit?”- “You know, three pounds of human feces that had to be removed by the city!” This conversation slowly escalates, until loudkid is animatedly detailing how ridiculous three pounds of shit is, and that that camp was a disgusting mess.

At this point, the kid on the end of aisle who we hadn’t heard form yet says “I dont really think three pounds is all that much shit” I guess he figures this is the best way to discredit the talker. And this is precisely when I lose it and burst out laughing. I couldn’t even look up at the dudes – I had made eye contact with the window kid when the other loud guy said something especially ridiculous up until now, but now I was just hysterically laughing to myself in my seat. I motioned to Dan that I was opening up a new tweet; this had to be documented. That’s when a guy about 3 rows back chimes in.

Keep in mind, it’s a 1am train on a Saturday night. There are lots of characters on this train. Some asleep, some drunk and/or high, some tired from a long day/night of partying/whatever. There aren’t any kids really, which is sort of important.

So this dude a few rows back holds up his water bottle and starts saying something seemingly profound. I thought he was going to say something good – how ridiculous the loudguy was, or how he totally agreed with him and fuck those hippies! But instead, he said “This is a pound! Three pounds is the same as three water bottles!” I think his point was that he agreed with the other guy; that that is horribly disgusting and those occupiers are gross and lazy. I couldn’t really tell.

At this point, everyone in the train car bursts out laughing. Just that one bystander deciding to say something, even if it was totally silly, gave everyone permission to chime in – either by laughing, or by saying something of their own. I felt like I was already a part of this conversation and had felt this permission granted to me a few seconds before, when I was obviously laughing aloud. But when one person, clearly unrelated to these dudes, decided he couldn’t be silent any longer, everyone on the train agreed. More than one person announced “The shit is really hitting the fan now!” White Plains was approaching and people were starting to get up. One man behind me said he was trying to go to sleep, which opened up the “It’s a free country” line. The water bottle guy even said the classic “Who do you think you are?” Everyone was getting into it now. The train was stopping, the the group of dudes was getting off. I said “I can’t go yet, I’ve gotta tweet this!” (Check out some awesome tweet responses from the friend Jeremy @serpicojones)

When I stood up, and the loud kid was reiterating his argument that tax dollars shouldn’t be used to clean up the messes of these protestors, I said my piece – I’d rather have my tax dollars cleaning up feces than paying for foreign wars. A girl near us vocally agreed, and asked me if this stop was White Plains (she had fallen asleep earlier. In fact, I took a picture of her sleeping because she was holding a Budweiser). I said yes as the loudguy finally ended his soliloquy with “hey, go suck a dick.” I immediately said something about how gay jokes aren’t cool, when the waterbottle guy retorted with “at least i’m getting my dick sucked tonight” or something to that effect. As I exited the train, I declared that the argument was legitimate when we were talking about human feces, but as soon as it turned to gay slurs, it stopped being worthwhile.

The doors opened and everyone flooded out, still engaged in conversation.

There’s something going on here. Even if this conversation was stupid, ill-informed, and seemingly pointless, it was a conversation on a train; a place where conversations between strangers are rare and curt. Maybe we were talking about something that wasn’t central to the OWS movement, and maybe it was vulgar and not the best example of productive dialogue. But people on the TRAIN were TALKING about this. The train, a place for quiet and resting and shushing and feeling weird about talking on the phone too loudly, became a place for something. A place where I felt safe enough to speak out about how I feel about the OWS movement, in a sentence. And a place where I could call out a gay slur and say, without hesitation, that it wasn’t ok, that it wasn’t cool. This is something. and people feel enough feelings about it to come out of their comfort zones and inject themselves into stranger’s conversations. And that is definitely something I can get behind.

[These are the highlights of what happened to me down at OWS on November 17th]

When we marched down from Union Square to Foley Square, students filled with anger and righteous rage, a proverbial fire in our bellies, the revolution under our wings, I was a little bit worried. At first I was nervous that we were inconveniencing people (the 99%!) by stopping traffic and making noise. I was afraid that we would be getting in the wrong peoples’ way and that they would be scared of all the people so close to their cars. But a few blocks in I wasn’t worried at all.

Instead of looking annoyed or angry, the people in their cars were smiling and waving, and sticking their hands out of the windows for high fives. The bus drivers were honking and clapping. The cab drivers and truck drivers were dancing in their seats. People riding the buses held their own signs and threw peace signs. “Off the bus/ come march with us!” Everyone was happy to see us! It became more clear to me that this is everyone’s movement. Most of the people in cars seemed to wish they were with us marching and taking a stand. “Whose streets? Our streets!”

And it’s important to note that this was an extremely peaceful takedown and march. There was chanting, and we stopped traffic, sure. but we weren’t damaging property, we weren’t upending cars (Did anyone at Penn State get pepper sprayed? That is a good fucking question). In fact, at first I was thinking how worried I would be if I was in a car in the middle of this – anyone could smash into your car or scratch it or dent it at any moment! But there was nothing like that, nothing of the sort. I remember consciously thinking how cool that was – that we weren’t angry at the wrong people, and that all those people in their cars got it. They were there with us in the streets – they’re their streets too. I felt full.

The moment it changed was about a block and a half away from Foley. I asked someone where we were, because I was tweeting, and he said we were nearly at the park. Right after that, we ran into a bunch of cops. Some in riot gear, some in regular uniform, some community event police officers. A whole slew of cops waiting for us, to threaten us and wrangle us. Or something. As soon as I saw them, they were upon us, pushing people onto the sidewalks. Mind you, we had marched a mile in the streets already. And at this point, a block from Foley, the streets were already closed to traffic it seemed. Or at least, there were only cops in the street.

Jillian and I had been acting as pseudo-marshals, since we had some experience with SlutWalkNYC. We learned about keeping a march together and without gaps, so cops don’t try to stop you at an intersection and let traffic pass, or so cops don’t try to break you up and make you feel like a smaller group than you actually are, and hence less powerful and unified. We also learned about keeping a march in the streets, not the sidewalk. If anyone is in the streets (and we were all yelling “Whose streets? Our streets” so why not?), everyone must be in the streets. It’s unsafe for those in the streets unless everyone is doing it. There’s also no real law against it – while in fact there are laws about clogging the sidewalk. So we were urging everyone to get “off of the sidewalks/ into the streets!!”

Anyway, our first police altercation came as soon as we saw the cops. A bunch were trying to push everyone onto the sidewalk. I saw the people ahead of me get pushed to either side, but I also saw some people simply walk through without any problem. Jillian and I marched on, and a cop seized us from behind and pushed us to the side, “Get onto the sidewalk!” Jillian and I had also learned in marshal training that a cop touching you in any way can be construed as assault, and that cops are afraid of this (as they should be) so a good tactic is to announce that you are being assaulted, and to demand that the cop not touch you. If things are escalating, you can try to get his name or badge number, and get people to chant that, along with the statement that that cop is assaulting you. Cops don’t like that. But this cop didn’t seem to mind when we both said “Dont touch me! This is assault!” He was big, and was able to push us both together (like children!). He didn’t respond at all to our announcement, and instead yelled “Get on the fucking sidewalk!” and threw us onto the sidewalk. We didn’t fall down, but I felt like I could’ve easily lost my balance. There was also a subway entrance right on the sidewalk he pushed us to, so there wasn’t much room to walk. And after a few paces, we got back into the street and marched on, without any immediate problem.

We were both distressed and upset, and we hugged each other in the street. I was crying a little but I felt more ready than ever to be there, to get arrested if need be, and to fight for this. It became very legitimate and scary to me. I’m still sort of upset thinking about it. I felt like the whole march until then was happy, and extremely nonviolent. The only violence I saw came from cops. I felt like their rage was unfounded and almost random, since we had absolutely none (directed at them, at least) as we approached them. It’s got something to do with this tweet, I know.

About a half a block later, when I could see the entrance to Foley Square, there were more cops. I was still urging people to get into the street (by this point, the street was definitely closed to thru traffic) and chanting, when someone came up next to me and put a camera in my face. I was in the middle of a hearty “WHOSE STREETS? OUR STREETS!!” when I realized it was a police officer, with NYPD on his navy windbreaker. I turned to him and said “WHAT are you DOING” and he sort of smirked, and said something like “I’m filming you. You’ll be arrested in 30 minutes for inciting a riot!”

The ideal reaction might have been to put my hand over his camera, if I was thinking on my feet. And I might’ve asked something about what law he was referring to, or said that I didn’t understand what he meant, or that I didn’t think there was any law about that, or that I didn’t think I was breaking any law. Shrugs. My reaction was to quicken my pace into the park, and scream back “Arrest me? Go ahead! I fucking dare you!” He turned and said that he would, before he was out of sight and I was severely shaken and angry. I stood in the park with Jillian and we debriefed before foraging into the larger protest area. I felt immediately safe once I was in the park. It felt like fucking border patrol. I sent three tweets, took a few deep breaths, and felt ok.

The rest of the day you can read about anywhere else. I waited in Foley for a long time, heard some speeches, but couldn’t see much around me because there were so many people and I’m so short. When it was time to march we moved several feet in the course of an hour, into a police-lined and barricaded area toward the Brooklyn bridge, where we had to stay for a while. We got word that the bridge was already full, and that 32,000 people were reported to be with us. That number surprised all of us – the police presence and strategies make it feel like it’s just you, in that group. I didn’t have any more contact or scuffles with the police – in such a big group, I felt much safer. And more importantly, from Foley Square on, the protest was police-controlled. They were dictating how fast we moved and where we could go. It was organized well and still very energizing, but far less freeing and exciting. By the time we got to the bridge, everyone’s energy level was much lower, and we were just glad to have made it there.