Travelogue: Oklahoma City
A local group had a get together and invited me to join them. The organizer is someone I had met at American Renaissance last spring, so we got to know one another socializing that weekend. He is the leader of a local group that used to be part of Identity Europa, but is now affiliated with American Identity. That’s the group Patrick Casey run to help local groups organize. I’m committed to supporting the local organizations as best I can, so I make arrangement to fly in on Saturday.
Because I have a tight schedule, I booked an early flight out of Lagos to Oklahoma City and then back to Lagos. Given that the main even was Saturday evening and would go to around midnight, it meant little sleep over a 24-hour period. The flight out of OKC was 5:00 AM, which meant getting to the airport around 3:30. That meant staying up until it was time to head for the plane. Taking a two-hour nap in the middle of the night is a good way to miss your flight, so I pulled the all-nighter.
I’ve always been amazed at my ability to run on limited sleep. Friday night I got about four hours sleep, as I had to be the Lagos airport at 5:00 AM to park and get through the security. I took a nap on the plane for a couple hours, but once I was on the ground in OKC, I went all the way through until the next morning. That’s six hours sleep in a 48-hour period. I don’t know many people who can function on so little sleep, but this has been a thing for me since I can remember. I don’t sleep very much…
I think if I was tasked with fixing the nation’s airports, the first thing I would do is ban carry-on bags larger than a small bag. No backpacks or roller bags. I bet half the hassle of loading a plane is idiots trying to drag a steamer trunk on to the plane. I saw a guy with a backpack so big it looked like he was setting off to climb Everest. He also had a big roller bag. Assuming normal clothing needs, that guy was lugging around at least a week’s worth of clothes, even assuming some heavy winter gear.
I think the second change I’d make is to put a weight factor on the ticket. Maybe call it a piggyback tax, just to be clever. I sat next to a 300-pound women coming out of OKC, who slopped over the seats on either side. I had the window, which meant I did not have use of my right arm, because her blubber had it pinned to my side. I’m not a body negative type, but her life choices end up taxing the rest of us on the plane. She should have to pay kicker based on her gravitational pull or maybe just her weight…
In Oklahoma City, I met up with the guys and the great Jared Taylor for a tour of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum. This is not something I would have done on my own, as I assumed it would be a small local thing. It turns out to be a big sprawling complex with exhibits on everything you can imagine that is related to cowboy culture and the American West. It is fair to say it a comprehensive collection of exhibits on the topic. They even exhibits from popular culture like movies and music.
The funny thing though is they have been instructed to decorate the place with the symbols of multiculturalism. We forget that Native Americans were the first token of multiculturalism in America. Slobbering over Indians is something you see in the parts of the country with connections to the Old West. The Museum is festooned with Indian stuff as a result. It also has blacks, women and Hispanics, so if you are from the east Coast, they have all the politically correct stuff you have come to hate….
The guy were all young, which is something I find a bit amusing. I’m becoming a senior man in dissident politics. Ten years ago the voices of dissident politics were paleocons like Steve Sailer and John Derbyshire. Now I’m the old guy in the room. In fact, at the dinner I was the second oldest person in the room. Jared Taylor was the only guy older than me. I don’t get hung up on the age thing and I enjoy being around bright young guys who are way more advanced than I was at that age. It’s encouraging.
The event itself was nice. I like casual affairs, as it is the social aspect that matters more than the speeches. In addition to the organizer, Patrick Casey and Jared Taylor were there to give a talk. I gave a talk on some items I covered in a podcast. I’m a not great at speech-making, but I’m not the worst. I think it was good enough to make the points I needed to make. I think I’ll repeat some of it this week in the podcast and expand on some topics are wanted to cover but did not have time…
All-in-all it was a great trip and the sort of thing that is good for the dissident soul, which is why I highly recommend building local groups. The place to start is the event that exist like Mencken and American Renaissance. It was at AmRen I met the Oklahoma boys and that’s how I found myself speaking to their group. Having a circle of fellow travelers with who you have regular meetings and social interaction is the way forward for dissidents. It’s great to see our young guys carrying that forward.
For sites like this to exist, it requires people like you chipping in a few bucks a month to keep the lights on and the people fed. It turns out that you can’t live on clicks and compliments. Five bucks a month is not a lot to ask. If you don’t want to commit to a subscription, make a one time donation. Or, you can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 432 Cockeysville, MD 21030-0432. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks, rather than have that latte at Starbucks. Thank you for your support!
To keep Z Man's voice alive for future generations, we’ve archived his writings from the original site at thezman.com. We’ve edited out ancillary links, advertisements, and donation requests to focus on his written content.
Comments (Historical)
The comments below were originally posted to thezman.com.
91 Comments