One Yard of Outing Flannel...AND DON'T LAUGH!

CIrcle jam at Charlie Smith's last night. Charlie's a local fiddle teacher who teaches strictly old-time Northwestern fiddling; he lives eight or nine blocks away from me on the exact same street. We can't, at least at this point, afford lessons, but he's been very generous and allowed me to come to the jams that he holds for his students, as I'm a WOTFA junior, I believe.

All the talk was about the Northwest Folklife Festival, held at the Seattle Center every Memorial Day weekend. It boasts of all kinds of performances, from reggae to hip-hop to classical to folk music from around the world. Everyone was asking everyone else: "Did you go to Folklife? Oh, cool! What day? What'd you see?" or else they'd be saying: "I think I saw you on one of those walkways." We haven't been able to go to Folklife in two years; this year we went for two, Sunday and Monday. There was talk about busking (at least one of Charlie's students did) and a couple of us had seen Charlie's act as well.

Charlie's jam is full of kids, since it's a kids' jam, but their mothers often come and watch or play guitar; and so the grownups were full of...other news; the shooting that had happened on Saturday. Like, "What do you think about security? Don't you think we ought to have more security for the festival?" "Yeah, yeah, but there are so many gates; besides, Folklife's a free festival, it's easy to sneak in. It's not like Bumbershoot." "And that guy had a concealed weapons permit though he wasn't mentally stable!" (I was sitting in a room of Seattleites, who are quick to point out governmental corruption)

And one mother was a little slow on the uptake. "You're talking about the...incident?" (Ever notice how adroitly indirect parents are on troubling subjects?) The kids were fiddling away unnoticed. I was the oldest person under eighteen, and I said nothing--then in walks Lynn, a girl about two years older than myself. "Hi, everybody! Did you hear about the shooting at Folklife? Weird...!"

So much for indirectness, I thought, wondering whether to laugh or to cry.

It's been running through my head since Tuesday, when I first heard about it. Three people got shot at a festival that I've been going to for about seven years, a place where I've always felt safe! I mean, when I was a little girl I didn't know the meaning of the word unsafe, and I really still don't--but when I was a little girl I didn't notice how many police cars hang around in our neighborhood, and my mother didn't tell me that if a guy started doing things to me that it was okay to fight him and to scream, and when I was a little girl my biggest worry was that Osama bin Lauden would be hiding in the recycling bin, a depraved twin of my saintly uncle, and chase me around and around with wheels instead of legs. The worst he'd do to me would be lock me in a well-ventilated dumpster with three-meal service and a separate bathroom, and I'd have to sit around in there for three days while my parents searched all over for me and finally found me in the incredible dumpster, hiding in Afghanistan (which I was positive would become the 51st state). Nowadays, I know what there is to fear, but I also know what not to fear. But I'd felt so safe and happy at Folklife. I mean, some people there are oddballs (and why do they go around offering free hugs, anyways?) but it was so safe-feeling. It would be a bit after dark and I wouldn't be looking over my shoulder. Now three people got shot there in broad daylight.

"Satan works everywhere," my mother said sadly, reading the news online.

I have to remind myself that so does God. And He can bring good out of anything...recently I've been thinking about 9-11 and I have to remind myself then, too. And of course, being human and fallable, I cannot trust God the way I ought to. This is where forgiveness comes in, because of what Jesus did for humanity on the cross, letting us be reconciled to God, giving us a way to have our sins forgiven and forgotten. But it's still hard. I'm still a sinner.

And, anyway, I can't help just wishing that Folklife would be perfect in every way, like nothing can be on this earth. The website we looked at said that this was the first major violence the festival's had in the thirty-seven years it has been running. Well, I wish that it would never happen again; and, while we're at it, let's get rid of the minor violence. Let's get rid of the strange-looking cigarette I saw filled with little tiny leaves that a guy had unrolled and was licking with fevered intensity. And let's get rid of whatever made those two teenagers I saw coming out of the women's restroom, smoking similar-looking cigarettes and acting as though they'd just clinched a deal with someone they hardly knew. Basically, let's get rid of sin and depravity. Oh, don't I wish...!

Some days I feel like Charlie Brown, who can barely cope with the fallen world and has no way to turn. I remember that one Peanuts strip where he's watching Linus who is curled up with his security blanket, hearing about the properties of "outing flannel", which brings security, happiness, and hope. He runs to the store and asks for one yard of outing flannel...but this is early on in the strip's history, and the round-headed kid has to face more and more depravity. That is a tragic strip, to me. This outing flannel doesn't work.

But God is there, I know. It is good to trust in Him; it brings peace. It means that I can step away from the horrors of this shooting and still find enjoyment in life. It means that I can believe that, whatever happens, Someone all-powerful is watching over me and will, someday, in whatever way, take me to Him to live forever without worrying.

And so, I was able to have fun at the jam last night, murdering fiddle tunes to the enth degree, learning new ones and promptly forgetting them; laughing at tune titles and chatting with friends, ruefully rubbing my sore fingers. Thank God for that.