Woke up around 6:30 in the little camp I made in the woods in Dedham. I rode my bike to the Star Market to get breakfast. A town like Dedham in Massachusetts has little to no homeless resources. I did a Google search to check for homeless services and found nothing. While I was at Star market I saw Erica, one of the most devoted and helpful Free Karen Read supporters. She was getting drinks and ice for all the supporters at the buffer zone. I helped her load up her truck. I got seafood salad and yogurt drinks for breakfast. I know it’s not the tastiest sounding of breakfasts, but I find myself eating less bread and carbs when I’m biking around.
At 8:45 a.m. I began walking towards the library to charge my devices. On the way I ran into channel 10 news and did a quick interview. I arrived at the beautiful Dedham library at 9 am.
I spent an hour and a half charging my phones and portable battery at the Dedham library which is right behind the Superior courthouse. I left to walk back to the buffer zone at around 10:30 a.m.
I was walking back to the buffer zone the same route I came to the library. I was on the sidewalk and passed a big bus, my phone was in my hand. There were state troopers across the street at the back of the courthouse. When they saw me on the sidewalk they began to scream at me to turn around. They were angry and aggressive. I began to yell back that I’m not crossing the street and that I will stay on this side of the street. There were two state troopers and maybe 4 bike cops. Suddenly two motorcycle troopers showed up and one of them began to charge me with their motorcycle on the sidewalk. I turned the camera on on my phone and began recording. I was really shook at that the fact that a state trooper would charge me with their motorcycle for being on a sidewalk and I began to yell at these despicable cops.
I spent the rest of the early morning and afternoon waiting for the verdict. At one point in the courtroom in the morning Alan Jackson Karen Read’s attorney addressed the fact that there was no not guilty checkbox on the Jury form. Karen Reed laughed, and judge Beverly canone said to Karen, is something funny?
The jury adjourned around 3:30 p.m. with no verdict so tomorrow will be another day of deliberations.
After hanging out with a few Karen Read supporters for a while in the buffer zone, I went to the library and hung out there and began to write. A woman I had known from the Karen Read movement sat with me outside the library on a bench and we talked for about an hour. I learned that her last name was Sacco and that she was related to the infamous Sacco from the Sacco and Vanzetti case. A cosmic coincidence. We talked about my project and homelessness, addiction, and mental health. There was thunder on the horizon. Eventually raindrops fell. It was around 6:30 p.m. and I had thought the rain would start at 9:00 p.m. or so the weather app told me.
I said goodbye to my new friend and went inside the library to charge my phones. I kept checking to see how hard the rain was coming down. I do not like traveling in the rain and I do not want to get wet, especially don’t want my phones to get wet. There was a piano man in the library playing to an audience of about four. At around 7:15, after a call with my girlfriend outside under the canopy of a tree, I decided to ride out and find a place to rest for the night. The rain had abated enough to travel I felt.
The place I had planned on sleeping was about 2 minutes away next to the courthouse parking lot. It was a big insurance building that had a wooded area behind the parking lot. The rain was light and I was confident that I would be able to set up camp before the downpour started. I rode around The cul-de-sac for the insurance building and saw that it was guarded like Fort Knox. I didn’t want to trigger cameras or motion detectors riding my bike into the back parking lot and into the woods. Just didn’t seem feasible. The rain had begun coming down a little bit harder. I looked at Google maps on my phone and I saw that just a little ways down the road is a small wooded area. I rode my bike there and saw that it would be perfect to set up camp for the night.
I pulled off the road and now the rain was coming a little harder. I set up my tent as fast as I could, I clipped in the rain fly and I threw all my gear inside the tent right as I did the downpour started and continued off and on through the night with thunder and lightning. Water was seeping through the tent a little bit and dripping on to me. I covered myself with my small blanket so that I wouldn’t be woken by the dripping. I was still relatively dry and I was grateful for that.
I had 10 mg melatonin gummies in my bag and after a call from my girlfriend at around 8:40 p.m. I ate my first gummy. I had detached to the small backpack from the large hiking pack and that was by my feet with my shoes. There seemed to be more water down in that area. I had camped on high ground so that I wouldn’t get inundated by flood. I used the larger hiking pack as my pillow and kept the phones inside so they wouldn’t get wet. I also had my portable battery and wallet on top of the hiking pack since I didn’t want that to get wet. I slept well through the night, but every time I woke I ate another melatonin gummy. In total I ate three 10 mg of melatonin gummies.