Tiny fires

I lost count after 200, but I figure it had to be at least 300. All ages here, whole families. They kept coming. As darkness fell, tiny flickers of flame started to appear. The humor and the novelty earlier in the evening has worn into a solemn silence. The car horns, mostly in support with thumbs-up appearing in passing windows, do the speaking. People on the corners tonight, here in suburban Seattle, and across the nation. Signs held up for peace, for answers, for a woman encamped in Crawford, Texas, looking to speak with a president who prefers clearing brush to talking to a mother who lost a son in his war.

This vigil is for that woman, Cindy Sheehan. I don't believe actions like this, with candles and handmade signs, here and across the nation will do little stop an unjust war or even get a president to talk to a mother of a slain soldier. The people came to light a candle and stand in some sign of support. Perhaps they are like me, figuring that if Cindy Sheehan could sit in a ditch in the hot Texas sun, then maybe the least we can do is stand on a street corner in a cooling midsummer evening, with a orange full moon rising above the treeline to keep us company.

And if these people here tonight are like me, they came out because there is a redemptive feeling to stand up in a noble effort at speaking out for peace and justice, even if you might not see the result right away. Again, you think of Sheehan losing her son, and you coming out and getting nibbled on by mosquitoes isn't that big of a sacrifice. Here, in the growing night, there is a silent communion of hope, and suddenly you feel better than you did in quite a while. A lot of the bitterness and futility drummed in by right-wing mouthpieces and inane news blips on CNN just slips away. You aren't alone in thinking this war is insane. Strangers smile and nod newcomers, letting them in to the line to wave at cars. Veterans of past wars stoop to help children light their candles. All the same goal. We believe in another way.

They hope, as I. The silence is awe inspiring, a polar opposite to the screaming and berating and spinning and obfuscating on right-wing media programs. No one does that here tonight. There are merely candles, that iconography that goes back to early religion all the way up to the symbol for Amnesty International. A candle in the night, a challenge to futility and despair. It is hope, and damn I haven't felt this good in a while.