It was a typical California day. The sun was high with only a few clouds aimlessly meandering towards the horizon. The warmth
beamed down from the blue sky, warming the skins of the students gathered in
Sproul Plaza. There was a turbulence building among the students that the weather was oblivious to. The grass now lay empty, with the thought of students basking in the sun's endless love left to a time of relaxation. Today there was thunder rolling in from the South, like waves of suffering spreading over shores.
The crowd was in a chaotic
murmur. Everyone knew something must be done, but
no one knew what. The slightest spark finally occurred as a
young man calmly pulled off his shoes. He felt the warmth of the concrete trickle into his exposed feet. He took a step. Now cold steel began to suck the heat back out. He took a few more steps and
felt the salty air brush his hair back.
The murmuring went silent. Anyone there will tell you it was not a silence of peace. It was the silence of opening a lid on hot coals. The brief silence as Oxygen rushes in, just before the coals explode into flames. Flames that would not be extinguished by any amount of water, and that would not be for a lack of effort. These flames would continue until the fuel is gone once-and-for-all.
The silent and expectant eyes peered towards Mario
Savio, barefoot on the roof of a police cruiser. They watched expectantly as his mouth opened. He took in a breath, and began to speak.
----------
Years later there was a small crowd gathered at Pioneer Square. A painted cardboard box with "vote-bot" written on the front sat awkwardly on a
young man as he wandered from person to person. The crowd's mind was on the number 350. A group of high school students
layed down in the shape of that number on the sidewalk, to show the number to the sky, to the gasses that were warming with the passing of each year.
Pigeons stood guard on a large white tent. Its occupants were soothed by the hum of electricity pouring into and out-of speakers. The elaborate sound system broadcast a fluent river of words spoken by a lady placed comfortably behind a sophisticated podium. Her soft breath rasped into a microphone. She told the crowd the drama they already knew but wanted to hear anyways. The world is getting warmer. A crisis of global proportions is on the horizon unless we immediately change our ways. People moved their ears in to hear as a bus indifferently roared by, marked by a trail of warm air, leaked from the comfortable-but-empty, heated
interior, and enough gasses and chemicals to keep a chemist busy for weeks.
Internet postings declared the importance of the people scheduled to speak today. The postings encouraged people to come to Pioneer Square at 1 pm, and stay until 3 pm, but as a distant clock chimed 2, the crowd was small and more people began to walk away. It was a Saturday, after all. There was shopping to be done, houses to clean, and friends to meet.
I should only include American deaths, though. We are actually doing those countries a favor by saving them from the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
As you can see, the human costs of these wars are unacceptably high. We need to pull out immediately to stop the senseless death and destruction.
