THE ACTIVIST AT SEVEN.

You seem to be holding what appears to be a stuffed seal. You are all of seven, with a cloud of fuzz for hair, barely contained in cloth barrettes, head pointed downwards in deep concentration. A small child's scowl on your face, the scowl of intelligence, that critical mind in early bloom. You are on a boat, with your mother and brother, somewhere sailing a lake of childhood. You mother holds a basket full of blueberries, looking nothing at all like how I pictured.

It’s 1967 and just look at your hair. Cropped close and messy, the bed-headed bohemianism of Bob Dylan or else a European street urchin. Same difference, you'd point out. Its all a refinement of image, any way you slice it. Something reminds us of something else; who can escape associations? Best to at least be associated with the positive, or else you’d also be quick to point out, the purposefully negative. The negative in the right ways, the negative to the right people. A little goes a long way, you’d say, with that knowing smugness of yours. Know your enemies and piss them off often. Know their boundaries and cross them on occasion. And while you’re at it, know your own. Know your limitations. Make sure to never show them.