Celebrating community in challenging times Dark roads lie ahead, but good people and good company make even short walks worth it.

OPINION |

By Claudia Meléndez Salinas

I have a new dog. His name is Capulin, and he’s a Lab/German Shepherd mix. A boy about 9 years old, obviously not a pup, but energetic as only German Shepherds (and Labs) can be.

As a new dog caretaker, I’m still not used to Capu’s rhythms. Is he sleeping too much? Does he need more exercise? He loves to walk, and he for sure can be manipulative: all it takes is a couple of cute prances to convince me to take him out to the park.

I thought it might be a good idea to take him to the Martin Luther King celebration in Salinas. Capu likes it when people pat his head, and he’s reasonably well behaved. And I really needed the fellowship on a day like January 20. Inauguration Day.

It is rare that Inauguration Day takes place on Martin Luther King Day. According to the Columbus Dispatch, it’s only happened three times before 2025.

And the irony was not lost on people, including Georgetown University Law Professor Sherryll Cashin, who called the coincidence an “incongruity” in a column for Politico. Detroit Free Press columnist Keith Owens saw it as proof that the universe has a “sick sense of humor.”

As a person with a certain aversion to the groper-in-chief, it has been surreal to survive the last few months. The twice-impeached former president, a convicted felon, the man who attempted to stay in power by subterfuge and force, was returning to the White House. Then came his flurry of promises: impose tariffs, deport millions of immigrants, purchase Greenland and recover the Panama Canal, rename the Gulf of Mexico. It’s hard to keep up; why even try?

So what to do on January 20, the day when he would return to occupy the highest office of the land, when the adjudicated rapist would be signing all the executive orders that I knew would be challenged immediately? Ending birthright citizenship? Amend the 14th Amendment? It’s not impossible, but it for sure will take more than the stroke of 47’s pen.

My Salinas neighbors offered an option of hope. Attend the MLK celebration, organized by activists Xago Juárez, Dr. John Silva, Councilman Andrew Sandoval and the Salinas Interfaith Alliance. First, a rally outside the Old Jail, where César Chávez spent three weeks for defying orders to halt the strike against Salinas Valley lettuce growers in the winter of 1970. While there, he was visited by Coretta Scott King, MLK’s widow, and Ethel Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy’s widow. A few dozen people stood in front of the Art Deco building when Tameisha Allen Smith read words spoken by Scott King before thousands of farm workers soon after her visit to Chavez at that same jail: “You cannot keep truth in a jail cell. Truth and justice leap barriers, and in their own way, reach the conscience of the people. The men of power thought my husband was a powerless man with grandiose ideas. He had nothing but an idea that people at the bottom could be aroused to fight for dignity and equality.”

The group marched on East Alisal Street, around Main Street, and back to the City Hall Rotunda. Inside, men and women who had recently taken part in a bitter election campaign, stood together to sing what’s often called the Black National Anthem, “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” A touching moment of unity in a building that has also seen its fair share of acrimony. There were also messages by the much-celebrated and always fiery Mel Mason and Guillermo Metelin Bock, an up-and-coming activist who’s rallying support for undocumented students. 

I wish I had left Capu at home so I could hear more, so I could partake of the fellowship a bit longer. All I could do was listen to snippets of the speeches, a few verses of the song, its chorus.

But the mission had been accomplished. My heart was comforted, not just at the sight of the Rotunda filled with Salinas residents, activists, politicians, clergy, youth, people who I know to be of good heart and intentions, brought together by the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and the desire to continue fighting for justice.

I’m also taking comfort in local and statewide efforts to organize and protect immigrants from what promises to be a horrendous four-year period — exemplified by Bock. The Monterey County Immigrant Rights Ad Hoc Committee hosted its first press conference on Jan. 15, and it will hold a Know-your-rights forum on Feb. 12 at Alisal High. The Watsonville Law Center had a similar event in December. Red cards that spell out the rights of every person in the United States are being delivered. Rapid Response Networks to assist immigrants if they are targeted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are being organized in Santa Cruz and Monterey counties, as in many other areas in California. The resistance is rising.

Those of us who care about immigrants — who are ourselves immigrants — are understandably confused and concerned. But consuming enormous amount of information is not going to help, and there’s only so much thinking and pondering you can do in a day, so I decided to take Capu to watch the sunset.

Moss Landing was glorious, the fire at the Vistra plant had already been consumed, the skies clear and the threat of hydrogen fluoride — a highly toxic gas produced by lithium-ion battery fires — no longer lingering. Capu got down to business: he pulled me along the shore, getting to work at sniffing prints in the sand, content to be outdoors and concentrating on the task at snout. Once in a while, he stopped, looked at the horizon and appeared to take it all in: the changing colors of the sky, the sea lions surfing by the shore, the ebbs and flows of a receding tide on the magnificent Monterey Bay.  

Heavy clouds loom in the horizon. But there will always be moments of respite to enjoy our loved ones, our community, its good people, and the fire that makes us burn with desire for freedom and justice for all.

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About Claudia Meléndez Salinas

Claudia Meléndez Salinas is an author, journalist, open water swimmer, and cat lover. | Claudia Meléndez Salinas es autora, periodista, nadadora de aguas abiertas, y aficionada a los gatos.