44 years ago today I skipped work from my first full time job so that I could see the rally on the mall in front of the Lincoln Memorial. The Memorial was one of my favorite places in D.C., grand, stately, simple, able to capture attention by holding it.

I was an apprentice boat builder. I sanded and stained the planks and polished the fittings of the yachts of the area yachting class. A small but poshed-up group striving for wealth without having real wealth to copy. Today, D.C. has a wealthy class, back then they were still deciding what they preferred, wealth or power, principal or prestige. They’ve all long since chosen. There are no more rallies. No needs when greed feeds our glory hounds and ladies.

I’m not certain why the 28th was chosen, but now many years later, it seems synchronous that Mississippi is the fattest state in the US. That TV factoid may be its moment in today’s daily spot light, but in ’68 we knew this day marked the day in 1955 that Emmett Till was abducted from Money, Miss. by two men after he had whistled at a white women.

The rally was meant to say thanks to the fallen of the southern marches. It never did get around to that. Somehow, even in that time, we never got around to celebrating the dead of peace, only the dead warriors, never the dead pacifists. I no longer have the dream of peace or justice. I awoke many years ago to a warrior credo. I took my walk thru the swamp. I marched, I celebrated. It is too late to get out of our own way. But is never too late to remember that day in August, when a crowded Washington mall was a rally for a dream, not a back to school sale.