America, you are ugly
and so beautiful
CLACKAMAS
B PRINT
O
o
People browse the books at Politics and Prose, the bookstore within the restaurant Busboys and Poets on U Street in D.C.
STORY AND PHOTO BY KRISTEN WOHLERS
I noticed it the instant I walked off of the plane into Washington, And it was.beautiful.
I visited the National World War If Memorial and as I gazed
D .C .’s Reagan National Airport. It was something that, as an
at each star which represented 100 lives lost, I stood still and
Oregonian; I thought I’d seen. It was diversity.
Scattered about me were people with dark skin, light skin, remembered my fellow Americans, of every color and culture,
wearing headdresses and speaking in other languages or with who had died fighting for me. I walked along the reflection pool
and towards the Lincoln Memorial, overcome by emotion; with
various American accents. And it was beautiful.
In the literature class I’m taking, at Marylhurst, we’ve been the Washington Monument, and the World War II memorial,,
reading stories by African American authors like James Baldwin, and the darkness of the sky and the light of the moon staring
Ta-Nehisi Coates and Edward P. Jones. Their stories have much at my back. I reached the memorial and my camera flashed as
in common, including that they speak to life as an African I snapped a shot of the very spot where Martin Luther King, Jr.
American and that they take place on the East Coast. Baldwin stood to give his speech, “ I have a dream. ” And I felt like I was
grew up in Harlem. Coates went to Howard University. Jones in a dream. Arid it was beautiful.
I walked through the Newseum and mourned all over again as
talks of D C. and Virginia.
So when I stepped off of the plane, walked through the I looked at the newspapers—cover after cover of the pain that
airport, rode through Virginia on the Metro, emerged from so many have experienced. The tears escaped unashamedly as
the underground escalator iijto D .C ., and stepped foot into I remembered the .day when so many lost their lives as a result
the restaurant Busboys and Poets on U street, I couldn’t help . of the 9/11 attacks. That day was ugly. So many days were ugly.
but feel like the pages I had read had come to life right before The war on terror has been ugly. Racism is ugly. The race to the
me. I experienced what every reader dreams of; being inside a United States presidency has been ugly.
With so much ugly, I choose to revel in what’s beautiful.
book. And it was beautiful.
With racial tension high in America and as I read these A nation where people who look different from one another
emotional stories from black American authors, walking the can walk the streets together, and can even love each other.
Where people who died fighting for the flag are honored with
streets of D.C. made me feel like I was a part of it all.
When I opened the door into Busboys and Poets, my eyes grew statues and fountains. Where imperfect candidates can pursue
large, because books were everywhere and because those books the presidehcy and where imperfect people, like me, can vote.
weren’t the same as thè ones in the Portland bookstores. The Where things are actually, physically, utterly beautiful;
shelves were teeming with writings by people of every color.
ON THE COVER: Eight Glapkamas students visited Washignton, D.C for the first time in October. Here are their photos and stories.
Cover desigh by Alexis Wager.
Most Trafficked Story This Week: Your culture can be my costume.
Z ciackamas Print NOVEMBER
2016 thedackamasprintcom
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