Time to start blogging again...

Hello pilsenprole readers - if any of you still exist. Yes, it has been a long damn time since I have been maintaining this blog. It has been increasingly difficult, first with my intensified job search in the final months of my nearly two years of unemployment, and than as I started my new job as the Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization's (PERRO) organizer to spend anytime composing new material. The really shame is that so much has happened in the past year locally and globally, that should have received more of my attention. So today I am making an extremely tardy new years pledge of sorts and committing myself to make at least a couple posts every month, from now on. Hopefully you may find my posts worthy of a few minutes of your time, and hopefully I can start my self back on the track of my original mission, to inform those who do find their way to my blog about important issues affecting my community, my city and my world.

I will start with posting a piece I wrote a little over a year ago for a special publication by Area Chicago. The publication, entitled Haymarket: 1886-2011 was meant to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the events of Haymarket and the first May Day. The publication included reflections on Haymarket, May Day and the struggle for the 8 hour day from a variety of perspectives. I was asked to write on Pilsen's connections to the events of Haymarket. What I wrote in the end, was an attempt to encapsulate Pilsen's century and a half at the forefront of social struggle.

Unfortunately the publication was released too late to really be featured at any of the many Haymarket commemorations held last year and as a result did not receive much circulation. The published version of my essay was a substantially shortened version with the understanding that the longer version would eventually be published on the web. To my knowledge, this never did happen. So my very next post will be the final unveiling of "1877-2011: 134 Years of Social Struggle in Pilsen", in its entirety, roughly a year from its planned initial release date.

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