Previous incarnations.

I was on a plane back to Vancouver and then straight into meetings this morning so I haven’t had much time to think about blogging or any other form of writing. At least I did manage to write in my journal while waiting for my flight out of Victoria. Grey morn on the harbour, but at least the water wasn’t choppy on the way out, because nothing makes me more nervous on the small planes then when they bob around like the tin cans they are.

In any case, I was on the island last night for a meeting; flew in after work, flew out this morning in time to return to the office for the day. Gave a talk on collective bargaining and the Canadian labour market in between flights. And as strange as all that sounds (even to me), this type of set-up has become increasingly frequent in the past year or so as my union responsibilities have expanded. I like it, even if sometimes I get a little overwhelmed by the number of people I have to answer to (like everyone I am elected to represent at the bargaining table and otherwise – it’s a lot!)

I had a couple of interesting encounters during my brief journey yesterday that were oddly linked, both to each other, and to my radical past. The first was getting off the plane and bumping into a younger radical anarchist I know who is now working for the provincial government. Suit, tie and all, he seemed sheepish about the fact until I reminded him who my employer has been for the last decade or so. Oh yeah. That’s right. He had forgotten that I spend more time these days shuffling paperwork in the bureaucracy or at the negotiating table than making the revolution. These two things are (unfortunately) mutually exclusive if you wish to maintain any type of profile and not get into trouble. And this is what I was thinking about as we parted ways and I headed up towards the meeting facility on Fisgard Street.

At the meeting itself I ended up seated beside a young(er) local president who I met for the first time only a few weeks ago. Probably about my age, seems decent enough as far as fellow union activists go – I get the impression that he’s local president primarily because no one else in his office is interested. So we get into a discussion about the conservatism of our union which he’s gauged is probably a safe topic with me, though he’s still a bit hesitant. So I ask him about his background in unions and politics and it turns into a discussion of who we know in common. Student radicals at different ends of the country at the same time, both members of the IWW, marxist-anarchist analysis, crazy stories about things we’ve done in our younger years that are oddly incongruous with our currrent government-worker, union “leader” selves.

Not the first time it’s happened to me, this meeting of anarchist “kin” in the course of my union or government work (in fact I’m amazed at how often it does happen to me). But usually, my reputation has preceded and other radicals seek me out. This time around my union brother seemed a little bit shocked about our shared political lineage. I think because he’s only seen me at the head of rooms, giving my spiel on bargaining, elections, economics – and I suppose that the most someone would think of me in those circumstances is that I might be a social democrat at best. It’s not that I get to address my union brothers and sisters about the need for a solid working class revolutionary movement after all, so I shouldn’t be surprised when my present face is divorced from my past beliefs and actions.

But there it is, and even though I want to lay it all on the table right there, I find myself cautious still at how much I do want new people to know about me. Because I am changing. Not so much what I believe, but how I act on it. And I am afraid that my past already binds my future in particular ways, so why make that worse? Still, there is the desire to connect with that part of myself in order that I don’t forget or lose what made me want to fight in the first place. It’s still there, that drive. Channeled differently, it has to go somewhere. Which is what I told him in my moment of unsolicited advice-giving – it may not be the most radical union but there’s enough good activists to give you reason to get more involved and stay. And just because we all look pretty straight these days, you’d be surprised at where some of us come from.

It’s true though, you know, my days of risk-taking reputation are pretty well behind me now. And while I appreciate the fact I no longer move through my days a touch paranoid, there is something I miss about making some of the trouble I did. But this decision was intentional, and one I am still comfortable with. It’s just funny the places I run into it again – that past, that person I still am.