Back from Alabama

Got back last night from performing at a candlelight vigil on the Capitol steps in Montgomery, Alabama. I can’t even begin to put into words how amazing the experience was from landing Friday night to wheels up on Sunday.

I was invited to perform at 16 Candles For Soldiers, a demonstration of support for our troops and calling for their return organized (almost entirely) by a 16 year old Alabama girl (“Pint-sized Peace Activist Stages Protest In Montgomery“). I got to support a really amazing kid with vision and passion who took action.

At the vigil, I invited the people attending to light candles in silence, remembering the lives lost in Iraq and Afghanistan. I read passages from Dr. Martin Luther King’s “Beyond Vietnam” speech (which contained one of my favorite MLK quotes: “the arch of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice”). And…

I got to do this just a block from his Dexter Avenue church, (where the bus boycott and civil rights movement was launched), just after sunset, with a rich blue starry Southern sky and hundreds of candles flickering while a group of loving men, women and children hold silent vigil for the heroes who’ve died in this travesty of a war… to sing the national anthem on those steps and to sing Semper Fi to the guy who stopped in his pickup truck to listen… and all of it possible because of the passion and commitment of a 16 year old girl from Alabama.

I saw a sign in the Atlanta Airport next to one of the many insanely-overpriced restaurants. Said “Proud To Be An American”. ‘Bout sums it up, though mine’d say: “Pissed Off But Still Proud To Be An American”. That’s me, the pissed off peace-and-justice lover.