"I Hate Violets"

No actually i'm just trying to make light of the word i'm really trying to say, violence.

Normally I would never post something ugly such as politics.  I try my best to encapsulate all the la la loveliness that surrounds us. My medium is through flowers and this blog. If Tucson wasn't my hometown I would probably shrug it off, or change the channel, and continue with the minor positive acts I am capable of doing to affect the world.

But I'm upset.

Plainly enough Arizona's reputation is in the dumps, and yes I care about those things.

Between the immigration issues, reserving Dr. Martin Luther King Day not for a great man but instead for our annual rodeo, and this latest loon shooting. One would think Arizona is filled with a bunch of narrow minded hicks, more than any other state? 

My parents moved from the blistering cold of Illinois and Canada to the southwest very much in the vain of Mr. Horace Greeley, "Go West, young man, and grow up with the country."

 

The Tucson I spent eighteen years growing up into was big sky, beauty, and killer Mexican food. An Arizona filled with rich diversity from the Hispanic culture and parents with a mind expanding art appreciating outlook, surrounded by the wild wonders of desert.  

 

We married in Tucson.

 

  

I'm tired. I'm tired of all the politico mumbo jumbo of over informed opinionated news, the beliefs, and the hatred. Should I too not speak up to the already yelling crowd? Ok, I'll just quite down and stick to what I'm good at... 

The only Belief I am certain of in my twenty ninth year into adulthood other than LOVE is ART. Visual, musical, performance, and literary.

These four acts have the ability to supersede boundaries of language, class, gender & race. At these moments in time the arts is all I have to look up to, so let us raise our voice the best way we know how. Here are a few people I believe in. 

Frida Kahlo

Wynton Marsalis

Li Cunxin

Reinaldo Arenas 

Anne Frank

p.s. Mom in case you didn't know the words in yellow are linked to articles. 

Comments

[Jen]

Love, love, love the post. I feel the same - this sad need to defend the place we come from that was such a beautiful, unique amazing place. Has that changed?

PS The judge who was shot is a Salpointe alum. Muy triste.

[jessica]

anne frank is a big inspiration to me. i will say when i was in tucson it was a magical world...hot, vacant, sunny, and beautiful.

[Elaine Brush]

Thank you for being moved enough to write about your hometown, Leelee.
What happened last Saturday is very sad, indeed, where ever it might have happened.
All we can do is counteract hatred with LOVE,
.....with the mentally ill, HELP.
Keep Tucson in your heart......
Love you! Mom