Categorical Aperitif

I don't have cable, so I could not have seen this when it happened yesterday. I saw two seconds of it on one of the broadcast-news overviews last night, but I did not get to see it in all its glory until I logged on to the intertubes this morning. Of all the cool things surrounding this inauguration, I think that my favorite may well be watching an 89-year-old Pete Seeger get to do this at the Lincoln Memorial:

The judicious Attaturk zeroed in laserlike on the very three stanzas that I was also delighted to hear. The first made me weep at seven in the morning; the second thrilled me to hear it sung at all, so often is the song sanitized for our suppression (certainly it was missing from the version I remember being made to sing in elementary school); the third sounded like an ancient prayer intoned by an American shaman whose entire life has in some ways been devoted to teaching us how to sing it along with him:

In the squares of the city,
by the shadow of a steeple,
By the relief office,
I saw my people.
As they stood there hungry,
I stood there whispering,
This land made for you and me.

A great high wall there,
tried to stop me,
A great big sign there,
said private property.
But on the other side,
it didn't say nothing;
That side was made for you and me.

Nobody living
can ever stop me,
As I go walking
that freedom highway;
Nobody living
can make me turn back
This land was made for you and me.

Amen. I know this fine moment is somewhat at odds with other, less pleasant facts about the inauguration festivities, but please forgive me if I take a moment to savor something good after eight years of so much bad.

I know that the inauguration will be all over the teevee tomorrow, but somehow I think that the best place to watch will be Democracy Now!, which is doing its own special coverage. If the tubes cooperate, I'll try to watch some of their streaming tomorrow; if the tubes don't, I'll check out some of the national MSM broadcast coverage. Either way, let's enjoy Chïmperdämmerung and celebrate the end of an error.