This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York island;
From the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
The Casas Adobes Safeway in Tucson where six people were shot dead and 13 others wounded is re-opening today. There will be live news reports, gawkers, people who will step in to buy a $8.99 bouquet of flowers just to leave them at the entrance, someone who just wants to buy paper towels and a pound of hamburger and get the hell out again.
As I was walking that ribbon of highway,
I saw above me that endless skyway:
I saw below me that golden valley:
This land was made for you and me.
The Big Box Retailer will be selling gun ammo today, as usual. The guys behind the counter look a little harder at their customers, but ring them all up. One man puts in for a transfer request to work in Electronics. “I ain’t gonna get sued, no way.”
I've roamed and rambled and I followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts;
And all around me a voice was sounding:
This land was made for you and me.
About five miles past Pima Community College, a family worries that their 20-year-old daughter didn’t come home again. Her behavior over the last year has been getting increasingly strange. She dropped out of school, lost her job at the garden center, stopped going out with friends, and the friends stopped calling for her. Her conversations are peppered with rambling talk about government spies and radiation poisoning, yet she eats at the table, showers, functions. Every phone call her mother makes ends like this: “There’s nothing we can do unless there is documented proof that she is a danger to herself or others.” Her father prepares to go out and look for her in Central, again.
When the sun came shining, and I was strolling,
And the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling,
As the fog was lifting a voice was chanting:
This land was made for you and me.
Two middle-aged men eat a hearty breakfast at a chain restaurant near the Tucson Mall, as they do every Saturday. One pats his jacket pocket; a smooth charcoal-black Glock rests there, unseen. “First thing I did, was buy this baby and some clips before goddamn Obama takes that away from us over this.” His friend nods in affirmation. The men get a third free refill of coffee, and discuss how they would’ve handled the Safeway shooter. “Gabby’s got a Glock, you know. She said so herself.”
As I went walking I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said "No Trespassing."
But on the other side it didn't say nothing,
That side was made for you and me.
The calls in the media for less vitriolic political rhetoric and blind blame begin to become…vitriolic. The electrician working at the Westin La Paloma today switches his portable radio from the all-talk station – “Tucson’s Jolt” – to “Cool 1450 AM…Good Times, Great Oldies.”
In the shadow of the steeple I saw my people,
By the relief office I seen my people;
As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking
Is this land made for you and me?
Registration begins for Spring Little League teams at a pretty, winding park in Catalina Foothills in North Tucson. Two attractive tanned mothers in workout gear hold Starbucks cups and make small talk as they stand in the line as their boys run around in the grass. There are no girls registering for the teams this season.
Nobody living can ever stop me,
As I go walking that freedom highway;
Nobody living can ever make me turn back
This land was made for you and me.
Woody Guthrie, "This Land Is Your Land"
© Copyright 2008- Marianne Spellman