Here’s a picture of my birth mom, Barbara McClanahan Walker Johnston. She’s not the mom who raised me, she’s the one who carried me in her body. She passed rather suddenly in September.

At the Celebration of Life, there was much talk about Barbara’s activism. She was willing to go into the streets to fight for justice, freedom, and equity for pretty much all of her life. For several years, she led a team dedicated to social justice at her church. (That’s the kind of thing UUs do.) Though she wasn’t in my life during the years that are said to be formative, I share that passionate desire to stand up to power when the powerful act without regard for those who are less empowered. Is it a trait that is passed through the blood, or DNA? Who knows?

Among the many things I wish I had done with Barb when she was still here is stand beside her in protest. My mother-in-law reminded me that once we were all at a protest, when MIL went with me and the kids to Topeka to demand Medicaid expansion. Well, that’s all I get, mostly by my own small choices, made many times throughout the years, one day at a time.

So I got this button made with her picture. It was taken on a boat between the US and Cuba in 1973 when I was in Kindergarten in a little Kansas town and she was with Venceremos Brigade. I’m going to wear this button whenever I protest. She’s left the physical body, but she’ll be with me whenever I’m out there making my voice heard in the streets.

We’ll be in Wichita next week for No Kings Day. Will you join us?