Our friends at The Believer sent a trio of novelists, poets, and critics to the Windy City to report from inside and around the Democratic National Convention. Daily installments of this limited series, which is inspired by Esquire’s 1968 coverage, will run on The Believer’s website for the rest of the week. Today, we’re catching you up on recent events with a new installment by Suzanne Scanlon, who chronicles her second day on the convention floor.
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It’s 9:15 now and I’m worried I’ll be late for the Women’s Caucus meeting. I’m worried I won’t be able to find it, but it turns out that everyone is going to the same place; it’s the only caucus this morning. I follow the women, reading T-shirts: DELEGATES FOR FLORIDA; TEXAS BATTLE BORN AND BATTLE TESTED. Cowboy hats. A man wears an elegant scarf stitched with the words “Democrats for Palestinian Rights.” A man passes by wearing a straw hat with a button: SAME PATRIARCHY, DIFFERENT CENTURY.
No need for worry. The caucus meeting starts forty-five minutes late. In the meantime, I listen to a ten-year-old DJ, and I take in more outfits: pink pantsuits; Ruth Bader Ginsburg leggings; red, white, and blue silk scarfs. Sparkles, sequins, rainbow-colored leis. More buttons: HOOSIERS FOR HARRIS. MONTANA DEMS. Canvas hats in red, white, and blue.
DJ Lily Jade is playing Stevie Nicks, Kool and the Gang, Bruce Springsteen, and Beyoncé. Hard not to be thrilled by a poised, confident tween, the youngest attendee by decades, wearing her sequin jacket, working the crowd, taking up her mic, shouting out to the “girl bosses” in the crowd.
Read the rest over at The Believer.