On the supple cushy cushions that replaced the customary firm, unyielding bus seats, I burrowed into my sleeping bag and stretching out my tired body, closed my eyes to nap. It didn’t matter that my toes touched someone nearby, that my back accidentally rubbed up against an other. I tried to make myself a little smaller as I fell off to sleep smiling. It was an intimacy that no one minded and we had begun to enjoy.
It was Day 2, traveling by bus from San Francisco to Southern California, heading for the desert of Palm Springs to hold the hand of someone we had never met and to join “the line.” “The line” as Hands Across America became known, was an unprecedented opportunity for national intimacy; an opportunity to express our shared commitment by holding the hand of another, and all we knew about that person was their common desire to end hunger in the world. Our line, would be only one among the thousands reaching across the United States.
And when we finally arrived, the desert was quiet, empty, and dry. We were told to watch out for rattlesnakes in the brush, no one told us what to do if we stepped on one. We were city people, come down from the North to participate in something that had never been done before. The pioneer in each one of us, had been awakened, we had a cause again. Rattlesnakes and intense heat were of little threat. The real fear was – would there be enough hands to hold, to keep the line unbroken, to demonstrate our commitment. There was a sense of desperation in the air, a need that people had traveled hundreds of miles to satisfy, the need to connect, to hold a hand, which held another’s, the need to belong, to be a member, if only for a moment, of a community called “Hands Across America.”
There were some in the line who wanted to be counted, who wanted to be part of history, yet not comfortable with the intimacy; they extended their hands, but their eyes said, “Don’t touch!” I heard a fellow, when asked to take the hand of the guy along side him, respond, “I’ll do it my way.” No surprise, “I’ll do it my way” has always been the mantra of us Americans, and that day was no different. They brought balloons, banners, photos of friends and family members who couldn’t be there, and tied string around their wrists, attaching themselves to another person further down the road, when there just weren’t enough hands to cover the distance.
That connection lasted only twenty minutes, not counting the years of preparation, not counting the hours and for some, days of travel. Twenty minutes of May 25, 1986, standing for the end of hunger, holding a hand that held a hand across thousands of miles, a brief, remarkable moment in time!
