Here I am- swamped.  I’m not complaining.  I’m honored so many folks want us to help them with their tax filings.

But, I am not in my office.  (As of three days ago, everyone who needs something done by the 15th of March has to come to us;  we have no time to waste traveling from one client to the next. )  Even so, my folks won’t let me work near them.  Now that we no longer have 25,000 square feet office/labs, they can no longer be on the opposite side of the building as I.

Why is that critical?  Because I need noise when I work.  Two or three TV’s blaring, maybe the same number of radios or even a CD playing.  That means I can focus on what’s in front of my eyes.

Even so, I take a 5 minute break every 55 minutes.  To let me stay focused.

And, during that break today (which was yesterday, when this was written), I was eminently proud to watch the next generation “take it to the streets”.

I didn’t even mind their co-opting of a slogan.  For decades, “Never Again” meant no more wholesale slaughter of Jews.  Over the last few years, it also came to mean no genocides in Africa, Syria, and Myanmar, as well.  And, now, it means no more shootings in our schools.

As I wrote a few weeks ago, I was a politically active soul in the 1960s.   Southern states got my attention because they refused to follow the law of the land- neither the Voting Rights Act nor the Civil Rights Act.  The federal government  was continuing an illegal war (that one was in Viet Nam), that finally (20 years after we began fighting it) received Congressional approval.  Except, the reason behind that action- the Gulf of Tonkin attack- never happened.  Just like there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

In March of 1964, the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) organized the first teach-in at the University of Michigan.  Within a few years,  high school kids  marched out of high schools across the US- 25,000 alone stood in protest in New York City to protest the Viet Nam war.

And, today (again, yesterday to you readers), across the US, high school students (and many much younger- from elementary and middle schools in Ohio, Tennessee, Illinois, and New York, among others) walked out of their schools.  Their cause was to demand action limiting gun sales, banning automatic weapons, and removing the unfettered capability for anyone to own a gun.  I watched the kids in Parkland (FL) assemble on their playing field. Kids in Chicago and New York.  (I’m sure there were more- but I had to go back to work!)

I also saw kids from DC area schools (Montgomery County [MD], TC Williams High School [Alexandria], a few others in Northern Virginia, and a plethora of DC city high schools) march onto the Capitol Hill grounds.  Where they met with Senators and Congressfolk letting them know they were not alone.

(We didn’t have a lot of Congressmen [they WERE men then] or Senators standing with us in the 60’s against the war.  We did have some of their support for the Civil Rights marches.  And, that support helped us garner more adherents.)

These young folks had simple messages.  (A key fact for any demonstration.)   Get rid of assault weapons.  (Don’t quibble with the term; we all know what they are.)  Make our schools safe.  Arming teachers doesn’t make us safe.  It’s time.  Now.

They also were reminding the elected representatives that they will be voting very soon.  (Many even in the six-month hence 2018 elections.)  And, they will be voting those who do nothing out of office.

It’s time for change.

Don’t forget- there’s a Saturday march, 24 March, in DC.

Even our shul- an orthodox Jewish congregation- is arranging for early minyan, so that everyone can walk down 16th Street and join the rest of the crowd, to make a stand.   You should be there, too!