Remembering Rachel

I've received several scathing emails from angry readers because I didn't post anything about Rachel Corrie yesterday, the 2nd anniversary of her martyrdom. Truth is, I'm still reeling from the tragic loss of the Baroness Lips Von Lipstrill, and wasn't up to writing about the death of yet another icon of human rights. But I did attend the Rachel Corrie Memorial Hootenanny at Evergreen State College last night. Unlike the tumultious orgy of grief that was the Susan Sontag Memorial, this was a solemn event, with just a few friends and supporters gathered around a small bonfire of U.S. flags to roast marshmallows and remember the noble crusader who gave her life so that Palestinian suicide bombers may live.

I never knew Rachel myself, as I graduated from Evergreen years before she ever enrolled. But there were others like her - young, spirited, so full of life that it oozed through their pores, causing severe acne and a strange cat piss odor that lingered for days. They were warrior poets, posessing an inspirational courage to fight for what they believed in without resorting to the cowardly jingoism of actually putting on a uniform and fighting.

Once such girl was Tawny Donahue. I can still recall her deep, green Irish eyes, that funny snorting sound she made when she laughed, the sparkly beads that festooned her flowing blonde hair like dingleberries on a Lhasa Apso. The last time I ever saw her was my second year at Evergreen, shortly after the annual Procession of the Species March. A bunch of us met back at the campus for the traditional post-parade toot on the communal hookah, followed by two or three hours of sitting on the grass and discussing the progressive sociopolitical benefits of anthropomorphic sexual fetishes. It was a way for us to commune with nature while standing up for the cause of social justice and human liberty.

Anyway, we were in the midst of some really hardcore animal sex when for reasons I still can't explain, Tawny suddenly leapt to her feet, shouted "FREE IVAN THE GORILLA!!!", and threw herself in front of a passing golf cart driven by a Mr. Leo J. Goldfartz, campus groundskeeper.

He had to have seen her - how could he miss her? She was a 5'-4" duckbilled platypus for Goddess' sake! But he didn't even slow down. The gruesome crunching sound as Tawny's beak was crushed under the wheels of the cart will haunt me for the rest of my days.

"You're killing her, you fascist bastard!" I screamed, my fuzzy bunny ears flip-flopping with rage.

"Goddam geese!" Goldfartz growled, squinting at me through his thick, coke-bottle glasses. "I'll teach 'em to shit on my grass!"

Cackling meniacally, he backed up and ran over her broken body another 17 times before the cart finally ran out of juice and campus security dragged him away. Our sweet Tawny lay staring at the sky, her tiny, flightless flippers twisted into grotesque positions. We buried her there in the Mao Tse-Tung Memorial Zen Garden, her screams of "I'm still alive, you dopehead freaks!" ringing in our ears.

Tawny was 23 years old when she died. Just like Rachel.

But she didn't die in vain. One year after Tawny's brutal murder at the hands of the Zionist Landscaping Cabal, Ivan the Gorilla was taken from his cell at the B&I Shopping Center in Tacoma and moved to a large, expensively furnished apartment at the Atlanta Zoo, where he now enjoys a same-sex relationship with an orangutan hairdresser. Tawny's parents sued and received a sizeable settlement from Merlin L. Halvorson, the war criminal who invented the golf cart in complete violation of international law. Me? Well, I didn't let Tawny's death sour me on humanity, but turned the experience into a positive force for good by joining a progressive think-tank devoted to preventing Israeli aggression against the indigenous Palestinian peoples.

So, as I stood watching the dying embers of the star-spangled bonfire last night, I thought about Rachel and Tawny, and how deeply their lives had changed mine, just as my Great Uncle Harvey's had when he jumped in front of a bus during the great Schmidt's Beer Drought of 1984. All three died exactly as they had lived: brave, defiant, and screaming complete gibberish. They will not be forgotten.

Comments

[Confederate Nazi]

Damn Larry, that was beautiful.

If I wasn't such a psychotic knee-jerk babykilling follower of Bushitler, I might actual feel bad about what I said about Saint Pancake. Instead, thanks to your oddly provacative story, I'm overcome with an urge to grease my palm with some sweet Iraqi crude and go flog the Muppet.

Toodles.

[Menstrual Rainbow]

Michelle Currie, we will never forget you.

[Teek]

I'm so grateful you didn't forget to mention the Zionist cabal, because, as all really smart folks know, they're to blame for EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING!!! Including my excessive facial hair in mid-life. I'm sure they put something in my bottled mineral water. No one can guard all the springs of water out there from Zionist infiltration.

Anyway, we'll say a prayer for Tawny and her broken belated beak. Sniff.

[I Love The BBC]

Fear not, justice will triumph. The people responsible for this outrage will not go unpunished.

[DancesWithBullets]

"We buried her there in the Mao Tse-Tung Memorial Zen Garden, her screams of "I'm still alive, you dopehead freaks!" ringing in our ears."

Hmmmm. Sounds to me like she didn't support late term abortion. Perhaps she was a Rethuglican in disguise?

[Che Guevarito]

Rachel's death hits all that much closer to home since I found myself in exactly the same situation last week.

I was attending a "Snuff Out the Candlelight" vigil outside a fertility clinic in Salt Lake City. My heart broke as I watched womyn after womyn enter the clinic, towing behind them litters of Ann Coulter and Donny Osmond lookalike children. All I could do was tearfully hand out pamphlets to inform the womyn of their only option next time they found themselves unexpectantly afflicted with pregnancy. I blew out a candle for each of their children to show them what might have been.

But the Bush administration, siding with big business as usual, failed to mandate parking brakes on stolen shopping carts, and mine rolled down a hill and tipped over, shattering my crack pipe. Now my tongue is raw from licking the pipe's residue off the sidewalk.

So Rachel, I feel your pain. I too have been martyred for the cause.

[Crouton]

According to this, it was the d@mn JOOOZ (not Caterpillar) who made the D9 into a military machine:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D9

If she had been run over by the non-military civilian version, she would probably still be alive today.

[Liberal Larry]

Don't blame the Jews, Crouton! People will think you're an anti-semite. Blame the Pro-Israeli Zionist Cabal!

[Crouton]

My bad.

[edog von winter]

the sparkly beads that festooned her flowing blonde hair like dingleberries on a Lhasa Apso.

My parents had a Lhasa with the same problem

This might be the funniest post I've ever read here, and not just because it's about Rachel Corrie dying.

[Friend of USA]

To think that had the driver seen her and stopped his bulldozer, not only would Rachel be alive but;

- The Israel / palestine conflict would be over INSTANTLY.

- The Iraq war would have been over within hours.

- Nichols would have not shot 4 people in atlanta.

- Dogs would not bite people nor cats no more.

and all other conflicts and imaginable sort of violent acts on this planet would be a thing of the past.

If only he had seen her.

We came so close to world peace ,
SOOO close ! ! !

[Friend of USA]

Who needs atomic bombs when standing in front of a bulldozer can bring world peace.

Sometimes the solution is so simple that we fail to see it.

( like the bad grammar in my previous comment...)

[brainsample]

Larry,
you're wrong. The problem IS the JOOOOOOOS! Who do you think makes up the Zionist Cabal? My Scientology Counselors tell me that the ceo of Katerpillar is a JOOOO. They also tell me that the Pentagon, CIA and State Department are controlled by JOOOOOOS. The only place JOOOOOOS are losing their foothold is in Hollywood where Mel Gibson runs amok and gets to spew his anti-semitic hatred of the proper Jews, (you know, the ones who existed 2000 years ago?). Finally, they tell me that the vast majority of Israel's population is JOOOOISH!

Hell, if we can't blame the JOOOOS, who can we blame? The Masons?

[BobTheBuilder]

In remembrance of this peace loving, Sweet, intelligent, young thing, I have placed a Memorial wall hanging in my rumpus room to commemorate my worshipful respect for this Ferocious Female Freedom Fighter. I still can't understand why there is no Palestinian S.W.A.T. team to stop these crazed Jewish settlers from stealing more Palestinian land! This is another nail pounded into the coffin of freedom by the BushChimpHitlerZionaziWarCriminal Regime!!!

[Grace]

Larry, I thought you went to Berkley?

[Liberal Larry]

I went to Berkeley AND Evergreen. Read the "About me" page, you fascist!

[Cricket]

Che Guevarita, I hope Larry lets you guest blog. I now have athsma, thanks to you and it is Bush's fault. If the Chimp had never been elected, Larry wouldn't have started this blog and my diphragm would never have expanded the way it did, nor would I have gotten four sets of abs.

Thanks to you both, I am now fit and trim and ineligible for welfare. I might be able to get a job with pay.
And Bush is to blame.

[Che Guevarito]

Thanks Cricket. Hopefully the day will never come when Larry needs someone to occupy his Birkenstocks because John Nota-Negroponte dragged him squealing to Guantanamo Bay to be housed with the jaywalkers and mattress tag rippers the U.S. is holding there.

Sorry about the diaphragm. You'd better get that fitted properly before you have your own candle to snuff out.

[Cricket]

Retro Fetal Expulsion Syndrome?

[BobTheBuilder]

My "stealing more Palestinian land!" Link didn't work. I'm not as think as you stoned I am, but I can't remember where that web link was pointing.

Damn you CarlRovePuppetMasterSvengali!

Please pass the Hookah...

[Dennis Brennan]

mmmmmmmmmmm...Schmidt's Beer

[Ratan]

Awwwww, you did it! You finally eulogized my most favorite person in the history of the world.

Long live St. Rachel. She makes us liberal folks look so stu... erm, brave.

[Grace]

"I went to Berkeley AND Evergreen. Read the "About me" page, you fascist!"

Oh, Larry, forgive me for questioning you. I had no idea you had TWO degrees!

Indeed, I raise my bong in your general direction!

[Jerry]

BORING.

Why not drill in Anwar?

When I change the oil in my car, I just dump the used oil down the sewers or pour it on a bush or tree I want to die. I'm doing my part to damage the enviroment where I live, so who the hell cares about some iceburg up in Alaska?

[SmirkyVonChimpHitler]

How dare you forget St.Pancake on her day of morning.