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CMCM member Haydn Reiss has a premiere screening next week of his new film at the Rafael (June 30 7:15pm with Norman Solomon and Alice Walker). This week Haydn and Norman came to the CMCM studios to discuss the film:
Monday, September 20, 2010
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Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Every Teacher a Peace Teacher
In middle school, high school, and college classrooms, I teach that nonviolence, peace, and justice are not utopian dreams but real and practical ways in which humans can affect the world around them.
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posted Jun 29, 2010
- Photo by Eva Blue.
Earlier this year, I walked into the university classroom where I teach a course in Peace Studies. Seated in a circle around the room were seniors just shy of graduating. They would soon become doctors, social workers, teachers, community organizers, executives, and leaders.
To open our semester together, I wrote a simple, three-word question on the board.
What is peace?
Silence. Stumped by this tiny question, no one spoke. They did not have an answer, and I would later discover why: It was the first time in their life a teacher had asked them to define peace.
Each year in the United States, millions of students graduate from high school and college, their diplomas certifying years spent studying the principles of science, mathematics, literature, and writing. These are the subjects we value as a society, and therefore we insist that our young people develop knowledge in these areas. Imagine if we graduated seniors who couldn’t read, or do simple math, or write basic paragraphs. Outrageous, right?
Yet these very same students will graduate without ever once studying conflict resolution. During their entire academic career, they will never be required to take a course on making peace, building community, or forgiving an enemy. The principles of violence and nonviolence will not be analyzed, the philosophy of Dr. King will not be discussed, and satyagraha—the practice of nonviolent resistance, which Gandhi called the most powerful force in the universe—will remain ignored.
Peace and justice are not utopian dreams but real and practical ways in which humans can live and affect the world around them.
We are neglecting to teach our students the most fundamental and urgent lesson: how to make peace in the world around them. And by forgetting to do so, we are promoting violence. As my friend and fellow peace educator Colman McCarthy once said, “If we don’t teach our children peace, someone else will teach them violence.’’
So each day, in the classrooms where I teach middle school, high school, and college students, I work to counter the violence, spark the conscience, and liberate the thinking mind. I teach peace.
Dismantling the Violence
At the most basic level, to teach peace is to teach that violence does not have to happen.
For too long in the West, we have acted as if violence is inevitable, a natural part of the human condition that sticks to us like the skin on our back. Nonviolence is written off as an afterthought—viewed, at best, as do-nothing-passivity and, at worst, as a long-haired fantasy of Woodstock. Responding to violence with violence is seen as the only practical solution, and the result is greater violence.
But this is changing.
Hundreds of colleges and universities across the globe now offer degrees in Peace Studies, with some universities reporting enrollment size doubling in the past few years. At the heart of each program is the declaration that nonviolence, peace, and justice are not utopian dreams but real and practical ways in which humans can live and affect the world around them. Violence and its dynamics are examined alongside the history, philosophy, and principles of nonviolence. The treasure chest of stories is opened, and like some reverse-Pandora’s Box, the ideals of peace-making are unleashed onto classrooms as students study the examples of Cesar Chavez and Vandana Shiva, Dorothy Day and Daniel Berrigan, Gandhi and Gene Sharp.
From a broader perspective, this academic trend towards peace-making is part of the widespread awakening—what David Korten calls “The Great Turning”—happening in response to the problems of our time.
Those problems are many.
The United States leads the First World in the following categories: prison population, drug use, child hunger, poverty, illiteracy, teen pregnancies, firearms death, obesity, diabetes, recorded rapes, use of antidepressants, income disparity, military spending, production of hazardous waste, and the poor quality of its schools (Paul Hawken, who published this list in Blessed Unrest, also points out that the U.S. is the only country in the world besides Iraq with metal detectors in its schools).
For the peace educator, this list is no surprise. Violence spreads like a virus. Contagious by nature, it follows a spiritual law that says that violence plus violence only equals more violence. Violence can never lead to peace, and the more we respond with violence, the more violence we create.
So teaching peace means dismantling this list. One great crowbar comes simply through asking questions.
To Teach Peace is to Teach Gandhi
“Could nonviolence have stopped Hitler and the Nazis?” I ask middle school students in my U.S. history course. Having already examined the philosophy of Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., the students create imaginary European nations whose mission is to develop nonviolent strategies to stop invading Nazis. After they present their plans, I tell them about the citizens of Denmark—so many of them teenagers barely older than my students—who monkeywrenched the entire Nazi plan through nonviolent noncooperation.
Vandana Shiva on Gandhifor Today's World
Some say terrorism makes Gandhi irrelevant. Vandana Shiva says we need him more than ever.
During our year together, these 12-year olds have surveyed the landscape of U.S. history. But where most history courses ignore the deep tradition of American nonviolence, my curriculum examines Jeremiah Evarts as well as Andrew Jackson, AJ Muste as well as Harry Truman, Henry David Thoreau as well as Teddy Roosevelt. My course features nonviolence alongside every story of violence. Students develop a long exposure to the people in our history who have resisted violence by following their conscience.
“Which is stronger: love or hate?” I ask high school students in my Democracy Studies course. We’ve already finished the biography of Gandhi, discussing at length the ideas behindsatyagraha. Gandhi is the Thomas Edison of nonviolence—he switched on our understanding of this universal force more than anyone prior, and to study and teach peace is to study and teach Gandhi.
Gandhi was skilled at civil disobedience, but he was even better at promoting practical solutions. Gandhi resisted injustice by creating alternatives, what he called “constructive programmes.” His favorite was the spinning wheel, which allowed Indians to forgo British cloth while actively spinning their own.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Every War Has Two Losers | Site Search   Upcoming Classes
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Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Leymah Gbowee: A Powerful Voice for Peace
Leymah Gbowee’s commitment to nonviolent resistance helped stop the Liberian civil war. She now helps other women promote peace throughout Africa.
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posted Jun 10, 2010
- Leymah Gbowee now lives in Accra, Ghana, where she is the executive director of the Women Peace and Security Network-Africa.Photo by Michael Angelo for Wonderland
Few human calamities are worse than war. But the Liberian civil war was unthinkable: Boys in fourth grade were conscripted, drugged, and turned against their own people; women were abused and humiliated; rape became a tool of war. Many of the 200,000 people who perished during 14 years of hostilities were not simply shot—some were maimed and hacked to death.
Leymah Gbowee, then a trauma counselor working in Monrovia, the capital city where many rural Liberians fled, heard firsthand accounts of the atrocities. She organized a group of women at her church to pray for peace. Soon after, they made the unusual decision to reach out to Muslim women as well, and their tactics changed from prayer to protest. With their posters and matching white t-shirts, they become a constant presence on roadsides, where they sang, danced, cried, and—most famously—withheld sex for peace.
The organization gained an audience with then-President Charles Taylor, who promised to attend peace talks in Ghana. But Gbowee and other members of Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace were doubtful that either the government or the dissidents were truly committed to finding a peaceful solution. To keep the pressure on, they decided to follow Taylor to Ghana, keeping vigil outside the peace talks. When the talks stalled, they staged a sit-in, blocking exits from the hotel until an agreement was reached, bringing peace after 14 years of violence and war. Two years later, they used their new political power to help elect Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf as the only female head of state in Africa.
Gbowee, whose work became famous following the 2008 documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell, now lives in Accra, Ghana, where she is the executive director of the Women Peace and Security Network-Africa, a grassroots organization that promotes women’s leadership in peace and security governance in Africa. I caught up with her for a brief phone interview.
Kwami Nyamidie: Most African names have meanings. What is the meaning of Leymah, your first name?
Leymah Gbowee: Leymah means, “What is it about me?” My mother had three girls and she was looking for a boy. When she had me, her fourth girl, she asked herself, “What is it about me that I can’t conceive a boy?” In Africa, many parents believe it is more desirable to have a boy than a girl. But now she is very happy that she had five girls.
Kwami: Who were the people who influenced you most when you were growing up?
Where we see a rising tide of violence and crime in youth, it is a cry from our next generation: “We need you to pay more attention to us.”
Leymah: I learned my Feminism 101 from my mother and grandmother. They were very spiritual and taught us to be independent and told us that whatever a boy could do, we, too, could do. In her time, my grandma Martha Laworo married three times because she never tolerated domestic violence. Anytime she was abused by any of her husbands she would pack and go. And without any formal education, she managed to be independent, and lived in a community where people treated her with respect. She spoke with authority and she had a mind of her own.
Kwami: You, the Liberian women, and the producers of Pray the Devil Back to Hell have won several awards. Which of these recognitions have been most meaningful for you?
Leymah: I place a high value on all the awards that I have received. But the one that really touched me as an individual was the award that I received from the Emmanuel Brinklow Seventh Day Adventist Church in Maryland. I was honored as a living legend. Here is a community of mostly black people who for the first time are giving this award to someone who is not from the United States.
Pray the Devil Back to HellLearn how a courageous group of women made the difference between war and peace in Liberia.
1. Watch the Trailer
2. Become a Dedicated Friend of YES! and get the DVD for free
Another award that touched me deeply was from the Refugee Women Association in Ghana. One of the things that the woman who presented the award told me was, “Whenever we read about you on the Internet, whenever we see you on TV, we know that we have somebody who is representing the interests of refugee women.” And while they didn’t have the red carpet, and the light and the media and everything, we had the traditional drums of Ghana; we had the dance and the traditional powder and everything to go with the tradition. I will never forget that day.
Kwami: What can you tell our readers to improve their lives and help them create a better world?
Leymah: In 1993, during the Liberian civil war the boys had nothing to do and sex was like their pastime. Some of the girls who didn’t want to do it were called names and ostracized. One Saturday, I got some popcorn and invited some of these girls into my house. We met for many months. That was the beginning of our teen-adult coalition. Three of these girls graduated from high school without getting pregnant. I tell you this because there are many things happening in our communities. Just look in your backyard. For example, where we see a rising tide of violence and crime in youth, it is a cry from our next generation: “We need you to pay more attention to us.” Can you start tutoring a child? Can you mentor a student? If you are able to touch one person, you have done a whole lot.
Kwami Nyamidie interviewed Leymah Gbowee for YES! Magazine. Kwami is originally from Togo, West Africa. A graduate of Seattle University's School of Theology and Ministry, he is a spiritual director and lives with his family in the Pacific Northwest.Friday, November 27, 2009
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George Tiller needs more than candlelight vigils | Salon Life
By Gloria Feldt June 1, 2009
George Tiller needs more than candlelight vigils
The doctor's murder is domestic terrorism, and if our leaders don't
act boldly, there will be more violence
I am done with candlelight vigils.
It is good and necessary that people gather together at a candlelight
vigil to honor the memory of Dr. George Tiller, murdered in cold blood
today at his Lutheran church by an assailant believed to be Montana
"Freeman" Scott Roeder. Tiller was a compassionate and courageous
doctor who provided abortion services to women in some of the most
distressing circumstances imaginable, when their pregnancies had gone
horribly, tragically wrong. He provided services when no one else
would, and he was stubborn enough to fight against everyone who tried
to stop him. So it is right that people express their grief in public
ceremonies.
But I myself am done with candlelight vigils. I have participated in
too many of them, from 1993 with the murder of Dr. David Gunn in
Pensacola through the seven doctors, patient escorts and staff
murdered over the horrifying five-year period thereafter. I can never
forget the day before New Year's Eve in 1994. I was, at the time, CEO
of Planned Parenthood in Arizona, talking on the phone to Pensacola
patient escort June Barrett -- who had been wounded when her husband
and the clinic's Dr. John Britton were murdered by anti-abortion
zealot Rev. Paul Hill -- when I received another urgent call from a
friend whose granddaughter worked in Planned Parenthood's Brookline
clinic. The young woman had just witnessed the murder of two
co-workers by John Salvi.
Each time, we held vigils all over the country. We wept and we pledged
to continue our work. Which we did, increasingly, in isolation. We
were the ones who had been wronged, and yet we were labeled
controversial, to be shunned rather than supported. The murders were
only the tip of the iceberg, among over 6000 cases of violence,
vandalism, stalking, bombings, arson, invasions and other serious
harassment.
Later, during the nine years I served as president of Planned
Parenthood Federation of America, we dramatically beefed up our own
security while figuring out how to make our health centers
nevertheless welcoming to patients and workers alike. In fact, we got
so adept at the task that during post-911 anthrax scares, we provided
federal government agencies with model protocols for dealing with such
threats. But though self-sufficiency is valuable, a just society
should offer much more succor to citizens who are attacked.
That's why today, after what happened to George Tiller, I know that
the only thing that will assuage my personal grief over his shocking
loss is for leaders across our nation to join me in expressing outrage
at this heinous crime, this domestic terrorism. And yes, they need to
call it out in exactly those terms. That's what it is.
I want to hear massive outrage on the part of the community. I want it
to start with President Obama. His statement today is a good
beginning.
But that's not nearly enough. He must immediately outline an action
plan to increase federal protection for providers and clinics and call
for stringent enforcement of the Federal Access to Clinic Entrances
Act. He has an opportunity to make a speech that addresses women's
moral right to reproductive self-determination as passionately as his
brilliant speech about race did during the primary. He can and should
lead the nation to a larger and more productive conversation about the
complex choices women make, and why women deserve the respect,
equality and justice inherent in the right to choose to have, or not
have, a child. He should bring together pro-choice and anti-choice
leaders and get them to issue a joint statement decrying Tiller's
murder as well as all such violent opposition to one another's
efforts. Now that would be real common ground.
But even if the president did all of that, I would still not be ready
for another candlelight vigil. The change we need in our culture's
attitudes toward women's reproductive justice has to happen both
top-down and bottom-up.
When it comes to decrying Tiller's unspeakable murder, I want to hear
it from Congress. I want to hear it from clergy, the medical
profession, the media and civic leaders: "This kind of violation will
not be tolerated. Period." I want to see leaders and people at the
grassroots joining hands together in support of those who provide
women with reproductive health services, including abortion. I want
them to put the yellow armband on, to assume Tiller's name as so many
took on the Obama's middle name, Hussein, when he was disparaged
during the election. Doctors have a special responsibility. David Toub
M.D, MBA, who provided abortions when he was a practicing physician in
Philadelphia, told me, "This could have been any of us who provide or
provided abortion services. I'm just as annoyed by some of my own
colleagues and the American Medical Association who marginalized us
and even looked down at anyone involved in providing abortion."
The silence overall from leaders so far has been deafening, as
attorney and longtime Arizona volunteer for reproductive rights causes
Leon Silver pointed out. And if our leaders remain silent, I can tell
you with perfect assurance what will happen next. There will be more
violence.
Dr. Tiller's friends, family, patients, colleagues and the many
pro-choice activists who have supported him over the years need the
vigil in Wichita and those springing up elsewhere to mourn the
67-year-old doctor's death and celebrate his exceptional life. The
larger community of reproductive health professionals and activists,
including those who bravely escort women safely into and out of health
facilities for abortions, need to cry and hug and lift one another up
on the wings of their convictions that they are doing God's work,
saving women's lives in the fullest sense of the word. I am with them
in spirit.
But when it comes to changing a culture that has marginalized abortion
by shaming women and hounding, even murdering, the doctors and clinic
staff who provide safe abortions, when it comes to changing a culture
bent on shaming women who are, in all good conscience, making the most
moral of personal decisions -- candlelight vigils alone will never be
enough.
About the writer
Gloria Feldt is the author of "The War on Choice: the Right Wing
Attack on Women's Rights and How to Fight Back," and former president
of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She blogs on politics,
leadership, and women at her website, GloriaFeldt.com, and is
currently at work on a book about women's relationship with power.
Related Stories
Dr. George Tiller murdered in Wichita Terrorized by anti-abortion
fanatics for almost 20 years, the doctor was killed in the lobby of
his church May 31, 2009 The abortion doctor Susan Wicklund has
received death threats and worn a bulletproof vest to work. But what
really scares her, she writes in "This Common Sec
George Tiller needs more than candlelight vigils
The doctor's murder is domestic terrorism, and if our leaders don't
act boldly, there will be more violence
I am done with candlelight vigils.
It is good and necessary that people gather together at a candlelight
vigil to honor the memory of Dr. George Tiller, murdered in cold blood
today at his Lutheran church by an assailant believed to be Montana
"Freeman" Scott Roeder. Tiller was a compassionate and courageous
doctor who provided abortion services to women in some of the most
distressing circumstances imaginable, when their pregnancies had gone
horribly, tragically wrong. He provided services when no one else
would, and he was stubborn enough to fight against everyone who tried
to stop him. So it is right that people express their grief in public
ceremonies.
But I myself am done with candlelight vigils. I have participated in
too many of them, from 1993 with the murder of Dr. David Gunn in
Pensacola through the seven doctors, patient escorts and staff
murdered over the horrifying five-year period thereafter. I can never
forget the day before New Year's Eve in 1994. I was, at the time, CEO
of Planned Parenthood in Arizona, talking on the phone to Pensacola
patient escort June Barrett -- who had been wounded when her husband
and the clinic's Dr. John Britton were murdered by anti-abortion
zealot Rev. Paul Hill -- when I received another urgent call from a
friend whose granddaughter worked in Planned Parenthood's Brookline
clinic. The young woman had just witnessed the murder of two
co-workers by John Salvi.
Each time, we held vigils all over the country. We wept and we pledged
to continue our work. Which we did, increasingly, in isolation. We
were the ones who had been wronged, and yet we were labeled
controversial, to be shunned rather than supported. The murders were
only the tip of the iceberg, among over 6000 cases of violence,
vandalism, stalking, bombings, arson, invasions and other serious
harassment.
Later, during the nine years I served as president of Planned
Parenthood Federation of America, we dramatically beefed up our own
security while figuring out how to make our health centers
nevertheless welcoming to patients and workers alike. In fact, we got
so adept at the task that during post-911 anthrax scares, we provided
federal government agencies with model protocols for dealing with such
threats. But though self-sufficiency is valuable, a just society
should offer much more succor to citizens who are attacked.
That's why today, after what happened to George Tiller, I know that
the only thing that will assuage my personal grief over his shocking
loss is for leaders across our nation to join me in expressing outrage
at this heinous crime, this domestic terrorism. And yes, they need to
call it out in exactly those terms. That's what it is.
I want to hear massive outrage on the part of the community. I want it
to start with President Obama. His statement today is a good
beginning.
But that's not nearly enough. He must immediately outline an action
plan to increase federal protection for providers and clinics and call
for stringent enforcement of the Federal Access to Clinic Entrances
Act. He has an opportunity to make a speech that addresses women's
moral right to reproductive self-determination as passionately as his
brilliant speech about race did during the primary. He can and should
lead the nation to a larger and more productive conversation about the
complex choices women make, and why women deserve the respect,
equality and justice inherent in the right to choose to have, or not
have, a child. He should bring together pro-choice and anti-choice
leaders and get them to issue a joint statement decrying Tiller's
murder as well as all such violent opposition to one another's
efforts. Now that would be real common ground.
But even if the president did all of that, I would still not be ready
for another candlelight vigil. The change we need in our culture's
attitudes toward women's reproductive justice has to happen both
top-down and bottom-up.
When it comes to decrying Tiller's unspeakable murder, I want to hear
it from Congress. I want to hear it from clergy, the medical
profession, the media and civic leaders: "This kind of violation will
not be tolerated. Period." I want to see leaders and people at the
grassroots joining hands together in support of those who provide
women with reproductive health services, including abortion. I want
them to put the yellow armband on, to assume Tiller's name as so many
took on the Obama's middle name, Hussein, when he was disparaged
during the election. Doctors have a special responsibility. David Toub
M.D, MBA, who provided abortions when he was a practicing physician in
Philadelphia, told me, "This could have been any of us who provide or
provided abortion services. I'm just as annoyed by some of my own
colleagues and the American Medical Association who marginalized us
and even looked down at anyone involved in providing abortion."
The silence overall from leaders so far has been deafening, as
attorney and longtime Arizona volunteer for reproductive rights causes
Leon Silver pointed out. And if our leaders remain silent, I can tell
you with perfect assurance what will happen next. There will be more
violence.
Dr. Tiller's friends, family, patients, colleagues and the many
pro-choice activists who have supported him over the years need the
vigil in Wichita and those springing up elsewhere to mourn the
67-year-old doctor's death and celebrate his exceptional life. The
larger community of reproductive health professionals and activists,
including those who bravely escort women safely into and out of health
facilities for abortions, need to cry and hug and lift one another up
on the wings of their convictions that they are doing God's work,
saving women's lives in the fullest sense of the word. I am with them
in spirit.
But when it comes to changing a culture that has marginalized abortion
by shaming women and hounding, even murdering, the doctors and clinic
staff who provide safe abortions, when it comes to changing a culture
bent on shaming women who are, in all good conscience, making the most
moral of personal decisions -- candlelight vigils alone will never be
enough.
About the writer
Gloria Feldt is the author of "The War on Choice: the Right Wing
Attack on Women's Rights and How to Fight Back," and former president
of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She blogs on politics,
leadership, and women at her website, GloriaFeldt.com, and is
currently at work on a book about women's relationship with power.
Related Stories
Dr. George Tiller murdered in Wichita Terrorized by anti-abortion
fanatics for almost 20 years, the doctor was killed in the lobby of
his church May 31, 2009 The abortion doctor Susan Wicklund has
received death threats and worn a bulletproof vest to work. But what
really scares her, she writes in "This Common Sec
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Monday, May 25, 2009
Requiem for the Last American Soldier to Die in Iraq
By BRIAN TURNER
At some point in the future, soldiers will pack up their rucks, equipment will be loaded into huge shipping containers, C-130s will rise wheels-up off the tarmac, and Navy transport ships will cross the high seas to return home once again. At some point - the timing of which I don't have the slightest guess at - the war in Iraq will end. And I've been thinking about this a lot lately - I've been thinking about the last American soldier to die in Iraq.
Tonight, at 3 a.m., a hunter's moon shines down into the misty ravines of Vermont's Green Mountains. I'm standing out on the back deck of a friend's house, listening to the quiet of the woods. At the Fairbanks Museum in nearby St. Johnsbury, the lights have been turned off for hours and all is dark inside the glass display cases, filled with Civil War memorabilia. The checkerboard of Jefferson Davis. Smoothbore rifles. Canteens. Reading glasses. Letters written home.
Four or five miles outside of town, past a long stretch of water where the moon is crossing over, a blue and white house sits in a small clearing not far from where I stand now. Chimney smoke rises from a fire burned down to embers. A couple spoon each other in sleep, exhausted from lovemaking. One of them is beginning to snore. I want them to wake up and make love again, even if they need the sleep and tomorrow's workday holds more work than they might imagine.
Who can say where that last soldier is now, at this very moment? Kettlemen City. Turlock. Wichita. Fredricksburg. Omaha. Duluth. She may be in the truck idling beside us in traffic as we wait for the light to turn green. He may be ordering a slice of key lime pie at Denny's, sitting at a booth with his friends after bowling all night. What name waits to be etched on a stone not yet erected in America? Somewhere out in the vast stretches of our country, somewhere out in Whitman's America, out among the wide expanse of grasses, somewhere here among us the last soldier may lie dreaming in bed before the dawn as the sun sets over Iraq.
***
At the Spar in Tacoma, Wash., the bartender - Jolene - is about to flip the lights for last call. Let her wait a moment longer. If she can wait a few minutes more, the young woman at the end of the bar will finally do what she's been wanting to do for hours. And it will surprise the young man she's been talking with - she'll kiss him. It will never be seen on a movie screen or written down in a book for people to enjoy centuries later. No one at the bar will even notice it taking place. But they should, because it's one of the all-time best kisses ever. As cheesy and hyper-romantic as it sounds, this is a kiss for the ages, and it's as good as they get.
***
Let the quiet moments of a life be recognized and not glossed over with thoughts of the past or thoughts of the future. For a rare, brief moment - let this moment be savored and fully lived. Maybe that soldier will drive a thresher in the Kansas sun today. Maybe she'll cheer at a Red Sox game as her husband laments the fate of his Yankees. Maybe he's in Hollister, Calif., thinking of the 100 things he'd written as a child - the list he titled "Things To Do Before I Die":
1. write a book
2. travel down the amazon
3. travel down the nile
4. visit each continent
5. live in a foreign country
6. learn to speak foreign languages
7. be a major-league baseball player
8. publish in Playboy magazine
9. ride a motorcycle across America
10. cross an ocean by boat
11. scuba dive
12. climb a mountain
13. go to every major league baseball park, especially Yankee Stadium
14. be a tourist on a moon mission with NASA or another space agency
15. ride on an elephant and a camel
16. visit Angor Wat, the Taj Mahal, the Great Wall, the Hermitage, the Louvre, Stonehenge
17. invent something useful and helpful for people
18. …and on and on…
How many items will he have crossed off that list before he must put it away again?
***
Could that last soldier be in front of a video camera in Hollister right now,recording a final message in case she doesn't make it back, making a videotape for a child who will never know its own mother?
If you're watching this then it means I'm not around anymore. I imagine you're probably in your late teens now. Maybe Mt. Kilimanjaro no longer has snow on its peak. Maybe the ice shelves on the northern coasts of Alaska have melted back and polar bears are dwindling in number. I always wanted to get up there and see Alaska. Maybe you'll make it up there one day yourself. I wonder if it's somehow possible for you to buy a plane ticket to Baghdad, to visit Iraq as a tourist. Will you visit the places where I've been? Will you talk to the people there? Will you tell them my name?
***
What will the name be? Anthony. Lynette. Fernando. Paula. Joshua. Letitia. Roger… Who will carve it in stone and who will leave flowers there as the years pass by? Who will remember this soldier and what will those memories be? Does he have brothers and sisters? Will his father sink into the grass in the backyard when he is told the news? Will his mother stare into the street with eyes gone hollow and vacant, the cars passing each day with their polished enamel reflecting the sunlight? What will the officer say when he knocks on that door?
***
The next time I'm waiting for a transfer flight in Dallas, or in Denver, or in Chicago, I'm going to make a point to watch for soldiers in uniform. If one of them is eating alone and watching football on a wall-mounted television, I'll anonymously pick up the check for them, like someone did for me once when I was in my desert fatigues and preparing to deploy overseas.
***
Maybe, just maybe, as I stand here in the quiet moonlight of Vermont, the American who will one day be the very last American soldier to die in Iraq - maybe that soldier is doing a night jump in Ft. Bragg, N.C. Each parachute opens its canopy over the darkness below - the wind an exhilaration, a cold rush of adrenaline, the jump an exercise in being fully alive and in the moment, a way of learning how it feels to fall within the rain, the way rain itself falls, to be a part of it all, the earth's gravity pulling with its inexorable embrace.
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510-644-1200 Fax 510-644-1255
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
Saturday, October 27, 2007
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Hello world!8 years ago
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First One Minute for Peace PSA15 years ago
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