Diego Rivera Mural Item in Leah Garchik's Column

Here's the e-message I sent to Leah Garchik in response to this item.

Dear Leah,

I was startled by the item about "Mrs. Diego Rivera" in today's paper.  Your contact person is right that the outline identifies Frida Kahlo as "Mrs. Diego Rivera," but they divorced in 1939 and didn't remarry until December 8, 1940, on Diego Rivera's birthday--in SF City Hall, no less!  He had finished the mural by November 1940,  so she was not yet "Mrs. Diego Rivera.   Life published the article on March 3, 1941.  Was it Life Magazine editors who chose her husband's identity as hers?

This may be something I should know--or remember.  I was the Director the Grant for  Instructional Improvement using Rivera's Mural of Pan American Unity at CCSF way back around 2001 or so.    We did a lot of lessons around it.

Anyway, if Phelan Avenue is name-changed to Frida Kahlo Way, "Mrs. Diego Rivera" will be identified by her own name!

Tina

Moms Up Front

I went to the first San Francisco house meeting for Moms Up Front, on Sunday, March 25. 

Moms Up Front is an environmental movement in which mothers take the lead.  All of the women there were concerned with social justice and made the point that we have to have a planet, or what good will social justice do?  There were three generations of women at that meeting.

The trained leader of the group was Linda Hutchins Knowles, who was hosted in the home of Maia, the daughter of Kathi Piaggli. 


There were three generations of women.  

The March for Our Lives in San Francisco

After the March for Our Lives, Annie wrote from France.


Yesterday the demonstrations against arms in the US were a big success! I didn't see images of the marches but I heard that there were at least 800 000 people protesting in the streets! I guess you were among them on Market Street (or another place) Tina and Nicole, and we all hope that something will be done in order to avoid some new school shootings again (but of course with a president supported by the NRA, it's just a feeble hope alas!)

I responded:

Yes, wasn't it wonderful to see--and hear!  I went directly from a meeting of OWL, where we learned more about and discussed local election issues (June ballot) to the Civic Center, where well-established people like the acting mayor Mark Farrell, Senator Diane Feinstein, and the former acting mayor London Breed spoke and then each introduced a high school student or a person who had been a high school student at the time of a shooting.  They all spoke passionately and well.  Someone who had been in the Columbine shooting talked about how she spoke out then, and after the Virginia Tech shooting, she made a donation, but after the Sandy Hook shooting realized that she wanted to do more--like being sure she had divested in anything supporting the NRA.  She urged us to do that.

It was Jonathan's birthday, so on the other side of my sign, I had one for him.  Also, the woman who conceived of the pussy cat hats for the Women's March promoted the idea of the evil eye--both to ward off evil and to keep a close eye on our politicians!  

Some really old slogans were recycled:  It used to be "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today" in reference to President Johnson and Vietnam.  Yesterday it was "Hey, Hey, NRA.  How many kids have you killed today." 

Another recycled one was "Arms are for hugging."

March for Our LIves

March for Our LIves Shared with Dropbox

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Shopping with a Beggar on West Portal

Yesterday I had an interesting experience with a woman who begs on West Portal near the post office, where I was mailing saga-type letters to a couple of friends. 

 She said she was hungry, and since the Manor, the cafe on that block,  was closed, I told her I could get her something at Walgreen's, where they have sandwiches and fruit.  

So she folded up her chair and came with me.  

She told me again that she has 14 children, and only one lives in SF.  The others live in Atlanta, and two are in prison--one for life.

She also said she'd rather get bread than a sandwich.  

By the time she'd finished shopping, we had a loaf of Hostess Classic Wheat Bread, a package of Oscar Mayer Deli processed turkey (I tried not to cringe), a box of Kellogg Raisin Bran, a gallon of whole milk--all of which we'd agreed on--and then when she thought I wasn't looking , she tossed in a bag of Cheetos Paws.  The tab was only $21, 52, which goes to show why poor people eat so much junk food!    I bought her two re-usable bags but couldn't figure out how she was going to carry so much.  Then she got on her cell phone and placed a call, so I guess someone came to get her and her groceries!

Post-Oscar

We had a post-Oscar party with food from the Oscar-nominated movies.

A peach for Call Me by Your Name

Mushrooms , toast we can crunch on to annoy whoever is sitting next to us for Phantom Thread

Keylime pie for The Shape of Water

Sandwiches and lemonade for The Post

Eskimo Pies instead of Dove Bars for I, Tonya

Froot Loops for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Wafers for Lady Bird (but maybe flat Chinese fortune cookies instead of communion wafers).

Booze and tea for Churchill

Water for Dunkirk

Milk (and still more Froot Loops) for Get Out

Pizza and ice cream 

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/p9pa1b9sepqh20b/AAChmlsBIEtADyJ1irYtKsUNa?dl=0