WWTBAM Bored

It's true this time. John Lewis passed away tonight.

When I was a freelance writer in Washington, DC, in the early 1990s, I was also working at Trover Card Shop on Pennsylvania Avenue. To make sure the rent was paid.

One of my regular customers was John Lewis. He would buy his own cards - never sent a staffer. We'd have nice conversations. He'd ask about what I was working on. We'd chat.

In 1992, I landed a job at the House Education and Labor Committee. One of my first day, I saw him on an elevator. And Rep. Lewis seemed genuinely happy to see me. "Look who's on the Hill!"

I have always considered John Lewis my friend, even though I hadn't seen him in many years. One of THE nicest people I ever met or will ever hope to meet.

Tonight, I mourn him as a friend.

Rest in Power, Sir.

Lewis was best known for leading some 600 protesters in the 1965 Bloody Sunday march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma. At the head of the march, Lewis was knocked to the ground and beaten by Alabama state troopers. His skull was fractured. Televised images forced the country's attention to racial oppression in the South. A Democrat from Atlanta, he won his U.S. House seat in 1986.

Watching that on TV is when I became "woke".

Lewis was our Congressman in the last decade until we were redistricted into what is now Lucy McBath's district. It really feels like the end of an era.

RIP to a valiant warrior for civil and human rights.