Ashland Peace Vigil, One Year and 12 Weeks, April 8, 2008

The Vigil continues. I am so proud of the people of Ashland. I took some credit for starting the Peace Vigil right around January 14th, 2007. We were sitting in our favorite hangout, The Black Cat Coffeehouse. A few of us were disgusted with the war and I proclaimed that I would stand on the corner for an hour each week and ask for Peace.

Others followed and we started the grass roots action with a Vigil that stood on the corner of Chapple Avenue and Main Street, in front of the Post Office, from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. every Tuesday. We did it for one year and one week. We averaged over eleven people each week. My spouse and I were there most every week, others too. Then, I made a commitment to participate in The Longest Walk, a walk across America in celebration of a similar walk that took place thirty years ago in 1978. I would be gone from Ashland. My spouse went to work, out of town, on a temporary assignment. That was in mid January of this year.

Now I need to mention that this Vigil is strictly word of mouth and voluntary. There is no organization or club or political unit that calls folks or rallies participants. In fact, there is one lone flyer posted high on the bulletin board at the aforementioned Coffeehouse and that's it. Yet in our absence, the Vigil has continued. I recently returned home from The Longest Walk and went back to the corner for the first time since my return. I tried to make it last week, but a late season blowing snowstorm had me homebound with three foot high drifts covering the driveway. But a friend sent me this picture, (posted below), of the hardy souls that stood last week. Three of them. And this week, there were five people who showed up to work for Peace and an end to this war and all war. The weather was cool, in the thirties, and a stiff wind came out of the East off the cold still frozen Great Lake Superior.

The Ashland Peace Vigil continues on Tuesday afternoons. I'll print a few new flyers and post them about town as soon as I get back from my current travels to Los Angeles. I'll be back by next Tuesdays Vigil. This is grass roots at its core. I am proud to be from Ashland, Wisconsin. I am proud to stand with these people and for the people who couldn't make it to Tuesdays Peace Vigil. Each week that we have stood there, the parade of cars with drivers and passengers waving, honking and flashing the peace sign grows. There are so many enthusiastic supporters., and only one or two dissidents. The supporters outnumber the naysayers at least 50 or 60 to one.

Thanks for coming to these pages to read about our Peace Vigil. And my offer still stands. Anyone who reads this blog and comes out to stand for Peace with us gets a cup of coffee, or other hot or cold beverage of your choice, from the Black Cat Coffeehouse on me. If you need a place to crash, I'll give you that as well. In the meantime, Peace to all people as ALL life on Mother Earth is Sacred.

Here's the picture from last week, April 1, 2008.


In the snowy Spring the people still held fast to the mission at hand, That mission is Peace.