Stacy Horn

I hate when I see evidence of good people behaving badly, and holding some ugly ideas. How will things ever change?

A sign on the highway. I pressed the shutter just a second too late, but it said “social distancing.” Which many runners continue to ignore. It’s supposed to thunderstorm, but I need a good long walk and plan to head out there in a little while. Look at the water in this shot. It was like glass. I pretty much never see it like that ever.

I was watching the news, they were showing Lafayette Square, and it was peaceful, when all of a sudden the police started moving in aggressively. It was really weird. It was before curfew, there was nothing that prompted it, and then out of the blue, they just attacked. They started gassing the crowd, shooting them with rubber bullets, and they really went at it. You could hear so many bullets being fired, and those stun grenades. One reporter said an elderly gentlemen kept getting hit because he couldn’t get out of the way. You can see it on replay somewhere, I’m sure. It was absolutely insane.

Then we all learned it was all for a photo-op for Trump.

This morning I’ve been reading accounts from priests who were there, and who were also chased away. Apparently the Episcopal Diocese of Washington had organized a group of priests and volunteers to hand out water and snacks to the protesters, (what a lovely gesture) and they’ve been expressing their outrage. This is from the Rt. Rev. Mariann Budde, the bishop of Washington.

“He didn’t come to pray. He didn’t come to lament the death of George Floyd. He didn’t come to address the deep wounds that are being expressed through peaceful protest by the thousands upon thousands. He didn’t try to bring calm to situations that are exploding with pain.”

You can read their accounts on Facebook. It’s horrifying. They didn’t have time to grab their medical supplies. Then I read reactions from people around the world about all that is going on, and I am ashamed for our country. I also read an account of those eight minutes that Chauvin held his knee against George Floyd’s neck, and how he kept his knee there even after Floyd lost consciousness, and even after paramedics arrived, and how Floyd voided his bladder towards the end, and I just can’t bear it.

But nevermind our horror. Trump wants to get a picture.

From my walk yesterday. I was right underneath One World Trade, admiring how it looked disappearing into the clouds, and a guy on a bicycle rode by calling out, “it’s a beautiful building, isn’t it,” and it was a sweet moment. Two strangers sharing a moment of appreciation for a work of art. People are good, people are good. Those priests and volunteers were helping those protestors fight the good fight. Think of them.

As I was walking through Soho a couple of kids were laughing and saying they’d be back tonight. They were not protestors (who were up in Times Square and elsewhere, actually protesting). Also, I noticed when I was watching the news last night, that many of the fires became intense and large almost immediately. I believe the people starting them were carrying accelerants, and were also not protestors, but trouble-makers of one kind or another.

I didn’t take this footage, I found it on YouTube, but this is the end of the crowd that went down my block. It was massive. They went on and on and on, they just kept coming. Again, this is the end of the crowd, but you can get an idea of how big it was. I cued up this video to where they started turning right onto my block.

Here are a couple of pictures I took. The second was in Sheridan Square, where they had stopped traffic.

I’ve posted about Ream Constance Hoxie several times over the years. Ream was a 17 year old New York girl who was murdered on February 4, 1920. The folder containing her case was in an old boxed marked “1921,” that was tucked away and forgotten in an NYPD warehouse. I mentioned her very briefly in my book The Restless Sleep.

Ream was murdered in her home on West 89th Street somewhere between 3 and 3:30 in the afternoon. She was hit in the head with a hammer seven times, shattering her skull, and raped. In their notes the detectives referred to her rape as having been “mistreated”.

I don’t know why it should matter, but I have always wanted to see her face. I’ve read all the case files, researched her, wondered about her, grieved for her. But I also felt enraged that on top of having her life taken away so brutally and at such a young age, she was completely forgotten. I guess seeing her face would make her a little less abandoned by history.

I noticed that someone viewed all my Ream Constance Hoxie posts yesterday, and I decided to take another look. Every year more and more historic materials are digitized and you never know. Well, sure enough, I found a digitized article written 16 years after Ream was murdered. The reporter was comparing her death to a recent murder. In the article was a picture of Ream.

I finally found her. Life can be so unfair, and of course it’s not unfair equitably. Some people suffer more than others.