Downtown Portland is pretty empty on a Sunday morning. But there are signs of life around the picturesque fountain on a plaza next to the Willamette River. A young bride in a white dress and veil is being photographed in front of the Salmon Street Springs fountain, its multiple jets catapulting arcs of water high into the air. It’s a perfect day. The fountain’s water parabolas are framing Mount Hood, which looks like a miniature painting from this urban spot 50 miles west of the glacier-draped Cascade peak. Milling around on the riverside plaza, the wedding party is all smiles.

On the other side of Salmon Street Springs fountain, clutches of homeless men and women are occupying park benches. They talk amongst themselves. They ignore the clean-cut, fresh-looking, finely attired participants in the wedding party, who return the favor.

Another homeless fellow, seemingly unassociated with those on the benches, walks by. He says something to a tough-looking man on one of the benches who has a pit bull on a leash. The pit bull man rises and chases the other homeless fellow out into the street. They are now standing on a corner opposite the fountain and the wedding party. The pit bull man starts shoving the other man. The dog’s not interested in this kerfuffle. It just watches traffic go by. The homeless man who is getting shoved turns away from his assailant and escapes up Salmon Street. The pit bull and its owner return to their friends on the bench.

The wedding party’s celebrations on the other side of the fountain continue without interruption.

  One of the cops hands out little green cards to the bench-sitters, including the pit bull owner. The cards bear the names and phone numbers of social services for homeless people and the mentally ill. “Have a nice day,” one of the officers tells the pit bull owner, who is inspecting his little green card.  

Three police officers approach the pit bull owner and his bench-sitting companions. The cops just happen to be there because a group of Trump supporters announced they would be holding a march from Salmon Street Springs fountain starting at noon. The police are setting up barricades that are intended to keep the Trump supporters separated from counter-protesters. One of the cops hands out little green cards to the bench-sitters, including the pit bull owner. The cards bear the names and phone numbers of social services for homeless people and the mentally ill. “Have a nice day,” one of the officers tells the pit bull owner, who is inspecting his little green card.

A few blocks away, on a street leading up to the riverside plaza, a young, rail-thin shirtless man with wild black hair and wearing dark-blue trousers with a white stripe is talking to himself and performing pirouettes as he walks down a sidewalk, dangerously close to the light rail tracks. People who are sauntering nearby cross the street, removing themselves from the shirtless man’s path of pirouettes.

As the shirtless fellow babbles and spins his way down the sidewalk, he approaches a tall woman—wearing long tresses, a pea-green tank top and a flowing green skirt—who is sitting on a bench and playing a conga drum. The tempo of the conga ebbs and flows with the spin cadences of the shirtless man, as if choreographed. The shirtless man gets too close. The conga player suddenly stands and walks up to him, squaring her shoulders, as if getting ready for a fight. She shouts something at the shirtless whirling Dervish. She has a man’s voice. Deep, resonant, and threatening. The pirouetting man twirls right on past the transgender drummer.

The spinning man has caught the attention of security officers, who begin to follow him at a distance. At one point the twirling man lies on the side of the street, just inches from traffic. The security officers gather around him and implore him to get up. He at first ignores them. He finally gets back onto his feet and resumes twirling down the street, the officers not far behind.

Meanwhile, back at the fountain, the bride and groom are about to climb into a black stretch limo that is standing by. Homeless people on the benches have moved elsewhere, including the man with the pit bull.

Police officers have finished setting up barricades in preparation for the pro-Trump march. A group of counter-protesters has set up a table where they are selling $3 buttons with sentiments such as “Fuck White Supremacists” and “Fuck Trump,” and expressing solidarity with Antifa, Don’t Shoot PDX and Black Lives Matter.

The numbers of Trump supporters as well as counter-protesters around the fountain are mounting. The cops try to keep the Trump fans and counter-protesters apart. Tempers flare. Shouting matches ensue. Rocks and smoke bombs are thrown. Police move in with pepper spray and flashbang grenades.

Minutes before this confrontation began, the 150-foot tourist yacht “Portland Spirit” was preparing to leave its berth on the Willamette. About a dozen tourists lounged on the luxury boat’s rear deck. They paid little attention to the scenes that had been playing out around the Salmon Street Springs fountain. They breezily chatted and laughed as a woman chirped over the cruiser’s PA system: “Ladies and gentlemen, we hope you enjoy Portland Spirit.”

The “Portland Spirit” headed upriver, its guests basking in the late-summer sun.

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Terrence Petty was the head of news operations for the Associated Press in Oregon and prior to that a foreign correspondent in Europe, where he reported on the overthrow of Communism in Eastern Europe, German reunification, Europe’s new beginnings after the Cold War, and NATO’s intervention in the Bosnian civil war. He retired in 2017 after four decades in journalism. He lives in Portland.

Photo credits: all images of 2017 protests in Portland involving Patriot Prayer and Antifa groups by Flickr user Old White Truck, CC BY-SA 2.0

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