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November 29: Pretty much everything is going slower than we had either expected or hoped. We thought the house would close this week. Now it looks like it’s going to be some time next week. We thought we’d have located a support vehicle for Jonna and the guys. Still looking. The one thing that is still on track is that we still plan to load a van and move our remaining stuff into storage Saturday morning. But I’m really concerned now that I might not be able to resume my walk for another few days beyond what I had hoped. I need to stop stressing about it and just do what I can. On the bright side, we had originally expected that getting all this done would take several breaks in my walk of several days and involve returning to Lakeside from ever increasing distances. At least we’ll be getting everything done in one swell foop so that next time we leave California behind us we won’t be returning for many, many months - at least. Your continuing encouragement - and patience - is priceless to me and I cannot wait to get back to my walk again. But this is one of those times when ya simply gotta do what ya gotta do.

On the support vehicle front, we discovered definitively tonight that the Winnebago-type vehicles scare the stuffing out of Jonna. There’s no way she’s going to be able to drive something where the passenger door is in another zip code. So we’ve narrowed the field down to what are called the class C type RVs - the ones where the front end looks more like a van or a truck with a growth on top of its head. We realize the rest of the vehicle isn’t any narrower than the Winnebago-type beasts, but it’s the psychology of it - if the part you’re driving looks more like a regular van, it feels more like a regular van, even if there’s an echo in back of you. We’re limited to looking at things for no more than about five grand, but there seem to be a reasonable number available within that price range that are still livable and driveable. We just have to find one...soon. Meanwhile, I am imparting my acquired wisdom from my chauffeur experience to Jonna, which consists of three basic rules that have kept me out of trouble and left me with a squeaky clean driving record. Those rules are:

(3) Never be more than the second fastest vehicle in sight. Addendum to rule 3: If any one of the vehicles has flashing lights on top of it, never be more than the third fastest vehicle in sight.

We hope to be adding another page to the website soon - one that features the newspaper stories that have been written about my walk. As I continue and more papers report, we’ll continue to add their stories to the page. That’s about it for tonight. I have a long day of painting ahead of me tomorrow. One side of the house to go and I hope to have it done before the sun sets on November.

November 28: It rained. Those of you living outside of the San Diego area won’t be able to wrap your heads around just what a catastrophic failure of the natural order of things this is, but it rained. Once you’ve lived here for more than about two years, you become what I have christened "weather spoiled". You wake up every morning having made plans that assume the skies will be bright blue and the sun will be shining - and Mother Nature simply accommodates you. So on that very, very rare occasion when you are met with droplets of moisture descending from the heavens and dampening the landscape, it is not merely an inconvenience, it is a natural disaster. Understand that it doesn’t take much - yesterday’s weather would have been considered a moderate drizzle by a Midwesterner, but here in San Diego it was a downpour, a deluge, a calamity of Biblical proportions wherein one dwells upon the possibility of gathering the animals two by two and seeking out a largish watercraft.

I remember the very day I officially became a Southern Californian. We had been living here for about three years. We decided one day in August to take an extended weekend and do a huge circle tour of Arizona, starting from Yuma, heading east to Karchner Caverns, then north through the White Mountains, back westward to catch Meteor Crater, to Flagstaff, then down through the red rock area around Sedona, farther south to Quartzsite, then back to Yuma and west to home. Jonna’s mother, who lived with us until she passed away last fall, was still in the earlier stages of Alzheimer’s and was able to enjoy excursions like this, so we packed our camping and hiking gear into the van, got Jonna’s mom on board and headed for Arizona.

During our trip, as we headed north along the twisting, scenic roads on the eastern side of the state, we had made plans to stop for a while at a park near the top of the White Mountains to do a little hiking and sightseeing. But when we pulled into the parking area where we had intended to begin this chapter of our exploration, it was raining. And we looked around and discovered that while we had packed all of our camping and hiking stuff and enough provisions for several days on the road, we did not have so much as a single umbrella in the van. No rain ponchos. No tarps. You see, it was August, and having lived in San Diego for three years, it had never even occurred to us that it might rain. So we sat there quietly, watching the raindrops skittering down the windshield, and it suddenly dawned on me, "I have become an official Southern Californian." When one plans a multiple day outing such as ours and never even stops to consider the possibility that it might involve encountering rainfall, one has become a Southern Californian. While I was a chauffeur, I always carried a couple of umbrellas in my chauffeur’s bag, because the number of people in southern California who own umbrellas is roughly equivalent to the number of people in southern California who do not own cell phones.

So yesterday was a disaster. No house painting, of course. We still have stuff set up all around the house that we’re trying to sell. We pulled stuff that could get damaged back inside or put tarps over the larger items, but a good portion of this morning will be spent drying things off. Also this morning I’m going to have to zip out over the mountains to El Centro to rent the storage place for our remaining belongings. We found a place at a good price, but discovered yesterday that they only do business in person. No credit card over the phone arrangements. So I have to drive out to rent the storage locker. Having been in the ministry in the United Methodist Church, we have had to move often enough to become familiar with the fact that, at a given point during the process of any move, one seriously considers the alternative possibility of a gallon of gas and a match. We have reached that point. Pray with me that, before I am able to locate the gas can and a book of matches in this chaos, the temptation will pass.

November 25: We sold the Jeep! Hooray! Huzzah! I don’t know what took so long, but we finally had someone stop by who recognized a good thing when he saw it and we sold it yesterday. We also opened up the place yesterday for a moving sale and got rid of a surprising amount of furniture and stuff...not that there still isn’t a surprising amount to pack and move, but it did lighten the load quite a bit. We still have lots we’d like to sell and will have the place open through tomorrow, but I doubt we’ll sell much more. Then we still have to pack what’s left. And I still have about half a house to paint. And we have to find a vehicle for Jonna.

Traffic on the website has, not surprisingly, dropped during this forced hiatus and I’m anxious to pick up where I left off. The news indicates pretty much what I expected - none of our elected representatives seem capable of taking the forceful stand necessary to put the madness to rest. That’s why we can’t let up. We all know how it works - at this point in time those of us who recognize what a catastrophe the past five years have been are hearing things we’ve hoped to hear for a long time from those who have an eye on the presidency in 2008. But we already know that as the election draws nearer, candidates will move more toward the "center", hoping those who are demanding change will follow along. We can’t play that game this time. It is up to us to hold their feet to the fire. I’m trying, through my petition, to offer our politicians a way out of the mess they got us into that approaches the subject from a completely different angle than any they’ve tried so far - one of pure logic and reason. It is not a liberal or conservative argument - it is a point of view that simply removes the obfuscation of the pretense of war against nations with which we are not in fact at war. Is there anyone who can rationally argue that we are actually at war with the nation of Iraq or the nation of Afghanistan? If this argument cannot be rationally made, then it is time to sit down and figure out exactly what we are doing and exactly where we are going. At this point in time, the United States is truly the proverbial loose cannon, and if our leadership cannot understand that and bring it back under control, then our citizens must. I wish I could resume my walk tomorrow. I promise I won’t delay one minute more than is necessary. I must get to Washington. I hope you’ll be there with me, in person, by proxy, or however you can.

I am thankful for those who understand that a nation’s true strength is evidenced by the compassion it shows rather than the violence it can render.

I am thankful that patriotism is marked by vigilant insistence on truth, reason and accountability rather than blind obedience or quiet submission.

I am thankful that in a world marred by war and terrorism, where the vision of a world living in peace seems like a distant dream, there are still those who refuse to relinquish the dream.

I am thankful that Elijah experienced the presence of God not in the violent wind or the shattering earthquake or the consuming fire, but in the peaceful stillness of a whisper.

I am thankful for those who recognize that the preservation of the community is more important than the preservation of self.

November 22: Painting and packing and packing and painting and packing...Kim had told me that my walk was like eating an elephant - you just do it one bite at a time. At the moment I feel like I’m trying to put away two elephants at the same time. Is there a soul in the world who approaches the task of packing and moving with any other emotion than outright dread? Jonna has done such an outstanding job while I’ve been on the road, but there’s still a mountain of stuff to do. Oh well, one bite at a time. Today I finished the painting on the front end of the house and got most of the office packed away. Thanks to our friends we haven’t had to worry about meals, anyway. Anne brought penni pasta and meatballs over last night and tonight Don Day came over and brought pizza with him. Don has been feeling much better the past few days and is grateful for your thoughts and prayers. Jonna and I are going to take a break for the rest of the evening and see if we can build up a little energy for tomorrow. Even with the generosity of our friends, Jonna will be making the traditional turkey dinner for tomorrow. Normally, we have at least a dozen people for Thanksgiving dinner, but this year it will be just the two of us - and the guys, of course. If any of you are nearby and would like to drop over, we’re having a sale at our house on Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. of a bunch of our furniture and stuff. Tables, chairs, bookcases, bedroom furniture and lots of other stuff like that. We’ll still be working away in the middle of it, but you’re welcome to come and see if there’s anything that strikes your fancy.

Haven’t had a chance to thank Tim for the socks yet - when I arrived home the other night they were perched on our doorstep. I have come to learn that socks are our friends. Although I hate to be taking any more time away from the walk than is absolutely necessary, we’ve set Saturday, December 2^nd as our load up the van and haul everything away date. We can’t realistically expect to get it all done before then. We’re both looking forward to getting this all behind us and getting on the road again - together this time. That’s it for tonight. Time to get some rest.

P.S. Also for local people - we have a huge, commercial-type chest freezer that is ugly as sin (the exterior is all rusted up) but works great. We will be having it hauled away for recyling before we leave unless we can find someone who would like to have it. It's yours for free if you can come and take it away, but you'll need some serious muscle and a full sized truck to do so. This beast sits under the carport in back of our house and keeps everything just great even in the hottest Lakeside weather, and we really hate to just have it trashed if there's someone who can use it.

November 21: I carved out a chunk of time today to post some pictures from the past week and a half here in the journal - check them out. Otherwise, it’s been a very frustrating day. With the growing realization that the trusty ol’ van just isn’t going to hold up to a cross-country trip anymore, Jonna and I have been looking for a small motorhome we could use as a support vehicle for the walk. We thought we had found the ideal one this afternoon. It was a 24 foot Dodge of 1984 vintage, but was very clean and well maintained - and at a very reasonable price. Trouble is, until we close on the house or sell the Jeep we don’t have the funds. We were going to go back this evening and put a $500 deposit on it to secure it for the next week or so until funds are available to us, but to make a long, sad story short, the couple who own it called us back a short time ago to tell us that, even though they really wanted to sell it to us, a man showed up and offered them $300 over their asking price - in cash. The sort of offer you can’t refuse. Sigh. So, back to the drawing board. And another plea: If you know of anyone who has a smaller motorhome they want to get rid of for somewhere under five grand, please let us know. What we need is something fully self-contained (toilet, shower, kitchen appliances, generator and so forth) yet no larger than 26 feet. That’s about as big as Jonna will be comfortable handling. We need something in decent mechanical condition to handle the trip. Any help would be much appreciated.

Just got finished with another futile exchange of emails today with a gentleman who somehow has convinced himself that what I’m trying to do with my petition is change the Constitution. Try as I might, I could not get him to understand that what I’m actually trying to do is preserve the Constitution by returning war powers and the balance of power between the branches of government to their normal parameters. As I said, it was futile. Oh well, I tried.

ERRATA: Try as I might to get everything together, some things fall between the cracks and I truly apologize. Someone had asked about acquiring the "Five Little Peppers" book from the Walking Sale and I can't find who it was. If it was you, would you please email me? Also, one of you let me know that Jackie Wagner's Protest Is Patriotism site - referenced on our Support page - is currently down, which means that the map of people offering accommodations and such along the way is not currently available. I got in touch with Jackie today and she hopes to have her site back up soon, but in the meantime, if you don't hear back from me about an offer of a place to stay please don't think I'm ignoring you - just keep on me until you get a reply and we can set things up, OK? Thanks!

November 21: Well, here I am back in Lakeside for a few days - but believe me, it’s going to be no vacation! I think I managed to get caught up on responding to emails last night before I crashed, and I’m up early to get a journal entry done before diving into the insanity of getting us moved out of the house. The thing that will keep me going is knowing that on the other end of this next week or so everything will be sorted out - Jonna and the guys will be able to join me on the road and there should be nothing else to hinder the progress of my walk. Actually, I’m very pleased with the progress so far - 215 miles in 15 days of walking! When we drive back over what I’ve already covered it’s really hard to take in the fact that I’ve walked that entire distance...but I have. In case you’re wondering, I really haven’t lost much weight so far - maybe a couple of pounds. My health is excellent. My feet are toughening up - although I’m still getting an occasional new blister. I’m pretty sore at the end of each day but tend to recover well overnight. And I am truly enjoying every aspect of the walk.

Even going through a little town like Wellton yesterday a couple of people knew who I was - although one of them thought I was walking for cancer. I am hoping that by the time we get near Tucson the word about my walk will have truly begun to go ahead of us. When I get to places like the Imperial Valley or Yuma, it’s nice that I’m getting some local press coverage, but by the time the publicity gets to peoples’ ears and eyes I’m already through the area and on down the road. I think I have a solid message that approaches the subject of the wars and the current skewed state of our government from a perspective that is hard to dismiss no matter what side of the fence a person is on, and thus has a real potential to effect change - IF people have a chance to hear about it and think about it. When I think about it, I realize that it really doesn’t get any more grassroots than this. There are still people who seem to have the impression that we have some sort of organization behind us...but it’s just me and my very brave and loving wife - and we’re both so swamped with getting the sale of the house and the moving out done right now that there’s not many hours left in a day for anything else. That’s why we’re asking that if you believe in what we’re doing, please do whatever you can to get WTETW noticed.

I guess I’m a bit disappointed after hearing from very enthusiastic people from both the LA Times and CNN the other week that neither has since called back. But I know those kind of contacts will come at some point. Some people suggest to me that the American public does not have the attention span to follow a walk clear across the country and continue to build and keep focus for that length of time and distance. But as I’ve often said, I believe that people will live up to or down to your expectations of them, and I believe that people are so tired of being deceived, manipulated and used and are so fed up with a half century of watching our government bounce all over the globe trying desperately to get us into a war somewhere in order to keep the economy chugging along (at the trivial expense, of course, of the blood and limbs and lives of our sons and daughters) that they are ready to put this war-as-economic-policy insanity to an end once and for all. They are ready to take democracy into their own hands once again and remember who it is we believe ourselves to be. They are ready to regain the respect of the world and the cooperation of nations - realizing that these are not the birthright of an arrogant superpower but rather honors we once earned, have now thoroughly squandered, and must work diligently, honestly and humbly to regain for the sake of our grandchildren. They are ready to do whatever is necessary to reclaim the country they love. I believe this. I expect this. We will see if people are ready to live up to these expectations.

November 20: (Very early) I need to address a couple of personal concerns this morning. First, after today's walk I'll be taking about a week and a half off before continuing my journey. I sincerely hope everyone understands that I'm not doing this because I want to, but because I must. We have to be out of the house by the 30th, so I have to go back to help Jonna pack, move our remaining stuff into storage, and wrap up all of our loose ends so she can join me on the road. Please bear with me.

Second, I've noticed a bothersome trend on the website. While our traffic remains up, averaging in the neighborhood of 200+ unique visitors per day and 300+ visits per day, the number of new petition signers and contributors seems to have declined a bit. This seems to indicate to me that I now have a regular and faithful audience - which is great - but the word is not getting out to new people as much as it had been, which is not great.

I'm swimming in uncharted waters here. I've been a regular internet user for a long time and know how to navigate my way around pretty well. But I've never been one who is always up on trends or who lives on the cutting edge. I know what blogs are, but haven't spent any time familiarizing myself with them. I'm aware of MySpace, but haven't messed with it.

What my walk needs more than anything else right now is PR - and I don't know how to generate it. I was thrilled a bit over a week ago when I was contacted by reporters from both the LA Times and CNN, but while both of them were very enthusiastic, I've heard back from neither. Notice like that would do wonders to help propel what I'm trying to do into the public eye, but until it comes, I need your help.

I want to ask each of my faithful readers to plumb the depths of their internet (and media) experience for ways to get WTETW noticed. How does a site get noticed by, say, Daily KOS or MSNBC's Clicked blog - or whatever other blogs or sites out there drive traffic? If you know, I'd deeply appreciate your doing what you can to get WTETW out there. Do you have media contacts? Radio, TV, press? Do you have contacts in the political arena? Representatives or senators who might like what I'm trying to do? Any and all of this would be extremely helpful.

Yesterday I forgot to mention that I passed the two hundred mile mark on my journey. I never thought I'd get to that point so quickly and, while having to take the next several days off will slow me down a bit, it should be clear by now that I will indeed make it to Washington...and I'll do it whether anyone else notices or not. But I have to confess that I - and I expect many of you - would feel much better if by the time I get there many millions will be noticing us. If there's anything at all you can do to help make that happen, you have my deepest gratitude.

November 19: Today was one of the most, um, challenging days of my walk so far. I had planned on taking a zig-zaggy course up north around the mountains to the east of Yuma - until I realized that it added a ridiculous number of miles to my journey, all to avoid about a three mile stretch of Interstate 8 that didn't appear to have any frontage road access. Last night I decided to heck with that, I would take my chances following Interstate 8.

A number of people who saw the article in the Yuma Sun this morning stopped to say hi or honked and waved as they passed. I stopped at a little laundromat at an RV camp where they actually had a couple of benches in the shade and a couple of people there recognized me. One lady said, "Well, I hope you're able to do some good for our country." I replied, "I'll certainly try, ma'am."

A bench in the shade is one of those real luxuries, I'm discovering. I can usually find some shade under a tree or large bush somewhere to rest, but sitting on the ground and leaning against a tree trunk isn't anywhere near as relaxing as a real chair or a bench. It's always a great pleasure to find myself approaching a place where I see a seat in the shade.

As I neared the end of the frontage road running along the north side of Interstate 8 today no less than three people stopped to give me advice on how to navigate the next section through the mountain pass. Like I said, there's no frontage road, so it becomes a sort of commando maneuver getting through a stretch like this. I figured the worst that could happen would be that I'd wind up with a ticket - which we can't afford - but I have had a lifelong knack of being able to talk myself out of tickets...by not trying to talk myself out of them. It really irritates Jonna. The few times I've been stopped, I just say yes sir and no sir very politely, admit I was doing something wrong and apologize. I tend to collect warnings rather than tickets.

Anyway, I try to avoid such instances if at all possible. One gentleman told me I'd have to find a place to get under the barbed wire (which wasn't very difficult) then walk through a culvert to the south side of the interstate where there would be more shoulder room. I followed his instructions, found the culvert, slunk through to the other side, and when I popped out I was only about 500 feet east of the inspection station on my right - and on my left, no more than 200 feet away, an officer was sitting there with lights flashing, having pulled someone off the road. Whoops! I ducked back into cover, beginning to feel a bit like Dr. Richard Kimble for some reason. Every once in a while I'd pop my head out to see whether the officer was done writing the ticket yet. They do tend to take their time.

Finally, the Highway Patrol car vanished and I scooted aross the road and out of sight of the inspection station as quickly as I could. The only thing I could do for the next three miles or so was walk along the shoulder, right out there in front of God and everybody, and simply hope that no more minions of the law would pass by until I made it clear of this chunk of freeway. In a completely uncharacteristic bit of good luck, none did - and I made it to the off-ramp to Ligurta without being hauled off to the pokey or otherwise accosted by armed and uniformed officials of any kind.

Ligurta is an RV park with a ramshackle bar - which was closed - a couple of porta potties (which, thankfully, I didn't need to use) and a little pavilion to one side of the bar consisting of a concrete pad with open-work wooden beams providing partial shade and several picnic tables and chairs scattered around. I chose a chair carefully as it was obvious that quite a few of them would literally disintegrate under even the weight of my hat, and waited for Ed to arrive.

November 18: I'm going to try to keep this short tonight. I'm with Ed and Tammy in Yuma again this evening. I was concerned about what kind of progress I was going to make today because my left leg was hurting badly enough that I taped it last night to see if that would help. I left it taped today because it seemed to be helping, but I was very sore starting out and figured I would be pleased if I could even make 10 miles for the day. As it turned out, when I got into the walk my feet and legs worked out their kinks and I was feeling fine, so I made more than twelve miles for the day.

November 17: I had neglected to mention last night that Jonna picked me up after my walk, we went to dinner, then I took Jonna up to meet Sue and Bob - and also took Finn and Spoof to meet their miniature schnauzer, Bonnie. It was no surpise that everyone hit it off famously, and it was a real treat to See Finn, Spoof and Bonnie chasing each other all around the yard. The guys have been in quite a turmoil with everything going on in our lives, especially we me being gone for days at a time. But after a little play time last night they seemed to shake much of it off and be able to relax.

Jonna drove me out to my starting point early because she had to get back to do some work for one of her home health care clients. We let Finn and Spoof romp through the desert for a bit, then said goodbye for the next several days. Jonna got in the van and slowly disappeared in front of a trail of dust that hung for a moment in the still morning air.

For some reason this leg wasn't as easy on me as yesterday's. My left hamstring has been acting up and I took several short breaks when I felt it begin to twang on me. I was pretty certain that I wouldn't make it all the way to Yuma - it was about 20 miles from my starting point and, while I've done one 20 mile day, it didn't feel like today was going to be another.

I was about halfway to Yuma when, to my great surprise, Duncan reappeared to join me for a while. He would wind up being my only companion for the day, and brought me a very welcome cold drink and a sandwich. I was slowing down considerably by the time Duncan had to leave and fortunately, Tammy and Ed from Yuma called to let me know they were looking for a place for me to stay for the evening. It wound up being their place. My feet finally refused to go another step about five miles west of Yuma, and Tammy came to fetch me. A hot bath to ease my aching bones and a great cup of chili (or do they spell it with two ls in Yuma?) and I'm ready to crash for tonight. Tomorrow I'll make it out of California and through Yuma. I'm planning on a fairly leisurely day to try to allow my hamstring some time to get it together. I should also be interviewing with the Yuma Sun tomorrow and I had heard from one of the local TV stations - channel 11 - earlier and will see if they get back in touch.

Since next week is Thanksgiving and there is so much still to do back at the house, I'm planning on taking three days off next week - Tuesday through Thursday - to go back and help my poor wife dig out from under all the chaos. We had originally talked about a two day break, but there's more to do that we can accomplish in that time. I will probably have to do the same thing at least once more before the house closes, when we're ready to move our remaining stuff into storage. But after the house closes and Jonna is able to join up with me everything should become a lot easier on us than it is right now. For tonight, it's time for some rest.

November 16: Today’s leg was to take me from Glamis down to the point where the railroad intersects Ogilby Road, about three miles north of Interstate 8 via a dirt road that parallels the tracks. Trouble is, I didn’t have a good idea of exactly how far this was and Jonna was going to pick me up after my walk, so I had to have some sort of idea of where to tell her to meet me. So I decided that the best thing to do was to drive to my starting point with Jonna this morning by going up the road I would be walking down, so we could determine the mileage.

We were running a tad late in the first place (Scott was going to meet us in Glamis and walk with me for a short distance), and when we got to the railroad crossing, we turned onto the road that parallels the tracks immediately to the west. It turned out to be a rough, washboardy, sandy 18.8 miles from Ogilby Road to Glamis. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to make it all the way back on that surface, but fortunately the cell phone coverage was good all the way so I told Jonna I’d keep in touch and update her on my progress.

Scott was there when we arrived and walked about a half mile with me before he had to turn back to get to a meeting he had scheduled. I continued on alone for the rest of the day. In all, I’d say I passed about a half dozen people on various off-road vehicles and about as many locomotive engineers as freight-laden trains rumbled by through the desert.

My feet behaved themselves very well today (I talk to them a lot), but I was concerned because I knew that whatever amount of the 18.8 mile distance I wasn’t able to cover was the distance Jonna was going to have to drive back over that tortuous road to fetch me...and again to get me back out of there. At about the nine mile point I had a brain drizzle (I don’t get brainstorms - a drizzle is about the best I can manage). I had my trusty, if antique, GPS on my belt and I knew that Ogilby Road was not too far to the east of me, across no more than a couple mile span of open desert. Unfortunately, my GPS doesn’t show Ogilby Road - told you it’s an antique - but I knew I should be able to find it without too much effort. So I crossed the railroad tracks and headed straight east to intercept Ogilby Road so Jonna could pick me up there at the end of my walk.

I hadn’t gone more than a quarter mile east of the tracks when I encountered a wide, smooth dirt road paralleling the railroad tracks...on the east side. This was the road we were actually looking for when we went out this morning - the one we should have been on from the beginning. Having found it, I could pick up my pace and wound up covering 15.2 miles today. It was easy to relay the new information to Jonna and she found me at the end of the day with no problem...and no bouncing over the ridiculous remnants of a road we had traveled in then morning.

Time to address another couple of questions I’ve been asked. Some people have asked why I don’t carry an IPod or an MP3 player or radio or something with me. First of all, I find great pleasure in the silence of the desert. Second, it gives me time to think about what I’m doing and how to respond to various questions I may be asked. And finally, I find the world to be full of brand new - at least to me - experiences every day and I don’t want to miss them. Today, I heard the rails on the track running alongside me, elevated about six feet above the surrounding terrain, begin to sing about a quarter mile before an oncoming train arrived. Then, after the train passed, they played a completely different tune - a humming combined with a sound sort of like the tinkling of loose change. I had never heard these sounds before. That’s why I don’t have any music with me - I find it as I go.

Another question I’ve been asked is why I’m going through such a completely desolate area as where I was today. To get where I’m going, of course. But the follow up goes - wouldn’t it be better to spend your time where you could be meeting and talking to people? What difference would it make if you just skipped a section like today’s and spent the time where it would be more productive? And my answer to that involves something called principles. I’m pretty sure most everyone who’s visiting here remembers what those are. I announced that I would walk from Lakeside to Washington, D.C. I didn’t say I’d walk the equivalent or that I’d walk most of the way. There will be times when, unavoidably, I’ll face sections where there won’t be another living soul within miles. If I skipped those sections, nobody would probably ever know...except me. And since I could not truthfully stand in front of people and tell them I’ve walked the entire distance unless I have actually done that, I will walk even those parts where I am the only witness to my own walk. Simple as that.

I was joined about a third of the way into my walk today by my FFTD. For those of you unfamiliar with the desert, that stands for my Fly For The Day. It is a seldom acknowledged but completely consistent phenomenon that people who have spent time in the desert know well: every person passing through the desert is escorted throughout their trip by a fly. Just one. The fly’s mission is not to watch over you or keep you safe or any such laudable task. It is rather to see if it can drive you completely bonkers before you manage to leave the desert. If somehow you manage to swat or otherwise eliminate your FFTD, you will be spared further harassment for that day - but a new fly will be assigned for the next day if you’re still in the desert. I have imagined a place somewhere on a remote edge of the desert where the flies all gather very early in the morning to receive their assignments. They are each given a tiny piece of paper with your photograph and a little scratch and sniff area so they can identify your scent. As I understand it, flies smell with their feet, so scratch and sniff is quite easy for them. My wife would insert a pointed adlib here about my own feet smelling which I would be unable to deny - it is an ancient McDannell curse, observable from birth, affecting both sexes, and a constant lament of the mothers of the clan. I could only retort that while my feet may smell, I do not smell with my feet, so there.

But I digress. Your FFTD will then search you out. Sometimes it may take it a while to find you, as you may be some distance from the assignment station. But it will find you. And when it does, it will merrily spend the rest of the day circling your head, buzzing in your ears, landing on your nose briefly or on the back of your collar - and generally doing whatever it can think of to drive you screaming into the chaparral.

But I have spent enough time in the desert now that I have found effective methods of dealing with my FFTD. Trying to swat the little sucker is more often than not nothing more than a waste of energy - they are quite agile, and if you are successful it will be a matter of sheer luck. But I have discovered that I am quite good at deceiving them. Sometimes I have been able to convince them that they are suffering from a case of mistaken identity - that I am not really me. Other times I have managed to convince them that there has been a clerical error - that my FFTD had already been here and I had successfully dispatched it to that great garbage dump in the sky. Today’s FFTD fell for the clerical error line. Apparently their bureaucracy doesn’t function any better than ours. It took me no more than ten minutes to convince it that it really needed to file a complaint at the assignment office tomorrow morning and it flew dejectedly away. I just thought I’d include this for the benefit of desert novices so they’re not taken by surprise by their first FFTD. And in case you’re wondering what any of that has to do with the purpose of my walk or my political thoughts or insights, I want to tell you before you bruise a synapse trying to figure it out. Absolutely nothing. Nothing at all.

November 15: I’m writing this the evening of the 15^th but may not be able to get in online until tomorrow - hopefully no later than that. Jonna arrived this evening in El Centro and we’re holed up in the Motel 6 with Finn and Spoof for tonight and tomorrow night, so I hope to get out at some point to find a hot spot where I can get a wireless connection and post this, along with updates to the route.

I’ve had a couple of emails from people who are a bit unclear about the mechanics of my walk, so I wanted to take a moment to make sure everyone understands exactly how I’m doing this. I walk as far as I can or to a predetermined spot each day of my walk. When I get to the place I stop, I do not necessarily stay there - in fact I do not usually stay there. For about the first week, while I was still within practical range of our home, Jonna would come and pick me up at the end of my walk and we’d go home. Now that I am out of range of home, I will sometimes be staying with a gracious soul (such as Kim or Sue and Bob) who have opened up their homes for me in the evening. Sometimes I will stay at a motel if one is nearby, as I did a few nights ago. Sometimes, if I have been unable to make other arrangements, I will camp out where I stop. Sometimes, at least for about another week, Jonna will come out to join me and we’ll either take a motel room or camp out in the van. BUT - and this is the important part - when I begin the next day’s walk, I ALWAYS begin it from the exact point where I stopped the previous day. This means that during the time I’m not walking I may be far afield from my stopping point from the day (for instance, I attended a meeting of the Peace and Justice Committee of the El Centro United Methodist Church tonight), but I always return to the place where I left off the day before, so that when I finally reach Washington D.C. I will have indeed walked every inch of the way there from Lakeside. No cheating. No shortcuts. An important part of the concept of what I’m doing is to be able to meet with and talk with various groups along the way who may be interested in what I have to say. It would be counterproductive to my purposes to simply plop where I land at the end of one day and wait there to start up again the next day. If there are people who want to come fetch me at the end of a day to talk to a group, say, 50 miles away, I’m more than willing to do that - as long as they can promise to return me to where they found me so I can continue my walk with no gaps. I hope this clears things up for everyone.

Today was without a doubt my easiest walking day so far. Even though I covered over 15 miles I felt just a little sore at the end of it and much better than usual. I suppose my feet are beginning to toughen up now, but I also tried lacing my shoes a little looser than usual today and think that may have helped as well. It was another solo day with the exception of about the last mile, when Scott Akers joined me as I came into Glamis. He plans to come out again tomorrow morning to walk with me the first mile or two. It was some amazing countryside today - the last few miles through the Imperial Sand Dunes, which have been the setting for probably a zillion desert movies, including the planet Tatooine in Star Wars. I can’t wait to get a connection where I can post some photos of the past few days - some incredible landscapes.

I am surprised - and to be truthful, thrilled - as I’m walking along and passing cars and trucks honk and people wave. They obviously know who I am and obviously are supportive of what I’m doing - it is a tremendous feeling and gives me constant encouragement. As Scott and I got to Glamis today we encountered our first gentleman who was antagonistic to what I’m doing. But after a few minutes of quiet explanation and thoughtful conversation I think I almost had a convert.

Tomorrow is going to be one of the more interesting legs of my trip. I’ll be following a "road" that follows the railroad tracks from the nearly nonexistent town of Glamis to the clearly nonexistent town of Ogilby. It’s a dirt road and I don’t think there will be anyone the entire length of it but me and a few trains. It’s simply the shortest distance from Glamis toward Interstate 8 and on into Yuma. I just need to make sure to take lots and lots of liquids and seek out a little shade, if possible, once in a while.

Since Jonna brought the computer with her this evening I’ve been able to read all your emails since I went into the Anza-Borrego on the 10^th. You’ve written straight from the heart and I want you to know that your words continue to empower me. I’ll reply to all of you as soon as I can, but for now circumstances still restrict my capabilities. Since Thanksgiving is next week and I still won’t be a ridiculous distance down the road, Jonna is talking about retrieving me for a two day break so we can celebrate the holiday together back home - the last holiday before our home is no longer ours. If I don’t get caught up before then, I figure I’ll take one of those days and devote it to correspondence.

I think once in a while about the possibility that, at some point in the not-too-distant future, I may have the opportunity to appear on a nationally televised show where I’ll have a real chance to talk about what I’m doing as opposed to a few second shot of me walking down some highway. If and when that happens, one of the things I want to do - I think - is to look directly into the camera and deliver a message to our congress people and our executive branch. I want to say something on the order of, "My name is Bill McDannell. I’m one of your bosses and I’m on my way to see you. I expect that many of your other bosses may be arriving along with me. And I just want to let you know that I am not happy."

November 14: For some reason it was a hard walk today. I made 14 miles but it felt like 40. Maybe it was the lack of companionship - I had nobody with me at any time today. Maybe it was he considerable wind which did let up for a while, maybe I was just pooped. I'm not too familiar with some of the distances and was under the impression that the leg to Glamis was quite a bit shorter than it is. It would be nice to make it as far as Glamis tomorrow, but that's 16 miles and if it's anything like today I'll wind up a bit short.

I'll have a bit of company tomorrow - Scott Akers, representing the San Diego Peace and Justice committee of the United Methodist Church, will be walking with me a bit tomorrow. This will be the first official church presence in support of my walk. The Peace and Justice Committee also voted to make a donation to us. I'm at Sue and Bob's again tonight - they have been so gracious and accommodating...and I nearly fell asleep in the bathtub when we got back today.

Sue and Bob Haney - great friends!

The evening has been pretty much insane. Jonna is way overloaded back home and I wish I could be there to help out. We're both stressed because we haven't been able to answer emails while we're dislocated like this - I hope everyone is hanging in there. She's going to drive out tomorrow evening and we're going to hole up in a motel for the night and try to let things go for a little bit. At the same time, she'll be bringing the computer with her, so if I can find a hotspot maybe I can catch up on emails and thank yous.

The story came out in the Imperial Valley Press today - front page with color photos. Eric did a good job, but neglected to include the website, so it doesn't help much in getting people to know what I'm trying to do. I also got a call on the road today from someone from channel 11 in Yuma wanting to know when I'd be coming through there. I told her I expected to be in Yuma in about three days and she said she'd check back with me as I got closer. Also got an email from Darren Fenger of the Yuma Sun and left him a message this evening. Word is beginning to spread in front of us.

I had to laugh when someone mentioned today that I need to get on our "advance team" about getting the word out ahead of me. Our "advance team" is Jonna and myself. Everyone seems to assume that you have an organization of some sort behind you. You, ladies and gentlemen, are our organization - and I think you're doing a terrific job. People are calling newspapers and TV stations and radio stations and churches and peace organizations - and for the most part I have no idea whatsoever who is doing the calling, but all I can say is Thank You...and Keep It Up!

Once again I need to get some good rest tonight. Tomorrow after the first couple of miles I'll be in the dunes, and I doubt there will be so much as a twig of shade for many miles. Wish me luck!

November 13: I arrived in Brawley today and am spending the evening with Bob & Sue Haney in Imperial. They invited me to use their computer, so I'm taking the opportunity to do a little bit of journaling.

Jonna dumped me in the middle of the desert Saturday to continue my trek and I hadn't gone more than a mile before Duncan (No, not THAT Duncan), an old geocaching buddy, caught up with me. For those of you unfamiliar with geocaching, first - you're missing out on a fantastic hobby/obsession, and second - you probably won't understand much of the rest of this paragraph.
Duncan walked a while with me - we happened to be along the stretch of road adopted by the San Diego Geocachers and I'm not saying this just to be nice, but it was the cleanest stretch of 78 I encountered. Duncan planted a geocache in my honor and also made me an official travel bug. I don't know if I'm the first human travel bug or not, but he's going to log me in and out of caches I pass along the way with the owners' permission. We both took pictures (I won't be able to post pics for a while), talked and walked some more, and Duncan headed back to Point Loma.

Not too long after that Andrew and Heather and their two sons found me moseying along as usual. While Heather took the kids up to Borrego Springs for a while, Andrew walked along with me, sharing another beautiful day. I'm still not used to people seeking me out to walk with me - I feel both honored and a bit embarrassed that people will go to that kind of effort just to meet me and talk to me. Andrew and I covered a decent piece of ground before Heather and the boys got back. They gace me a generous contribution then headed home.

I got up very early on the 12th and discovered I had stopped for the night only about two hundred feet short of the San Diego/Imperial County line. I stopped to have breakfast at the Blu-Inn, which turned out to be a wise move, because it was the last sign of civilization I would see for the next
twenty-odd miles. More dust and haze as the off-roaders were getting their last licks in for the weekend. The Blu-Inn kind of reminded me of the Cantina in Star Wars - all the sand bikers dressed in variations of Star Trooper uniforms and wearing helmets with dust filters jutting out at weird angles...it was a real trip.

I've been trying very hard to remain visible from the road at all times as I know there are sometimes people trying to find me, but this stretch of road has absolutely no shade. So I wound up at one point taking a break in a dry wash, taking advantage of the shade directly under the roadway. Another time I plodded a couple hundred feet off the road to rest under the only tree I
had seen for hours. I thanked the tree profusely. I felt bad later on when I was able to get in touch with Jonna and found out that Don and Marlene had travelled a total of over two hundred miles in a vain effort to find me and walk with me for a while. The only way they could have missed me was if they had passed by during the few minutes I was under the tree or in the dry wash. I'm so sorry, Don & Marlene. I'm sure we'll have another chance.

At the Border Patrol station where I ended the day's walk I had another one of those "So, where are you headed?" moments when they stare at me after I reply waiting to see if I'm joking. One of the agents said something I've heard more than once now - "I think it's a neat thing you're doing, but it
won't do any good, you know. Nobody's going to listen to you just because you walked across the country." I replied, as usual, "Maybe, maybe not. I guess we'll see." But what I really want to say is, "They damned well better listen to me - after all, I'm their boss, you know." We are their bosses,
you know, and I think we're all pretty tired of not being listened to. I think that this time we're going to be heard.

At the end of the day's walk I was still in the middle of nowhere - there is absolutely nothing around the Border Patrol station but sand - and feeling dirty and gritty and not wanting to spend another night under the stars like that if I could help it. So I decided to try hitch-hiking into Westmorland -
the next town. I hoped I could find a motel there and then get a ride back to the Border Patrol station the next morning to pick up where I left off. A fifty-seven year old, sorta grizzled looking guy trying to hitch a ride. Yeah, right.

Ten minutes later I was whizzing down the road in the company of a sweet young lady. Before you think I'm lying or she was psycho, it turned out to be Jennifer, who had written to me wanting to take some pictures and talk with me for a while for a paper she was doing for school. She had missed me on the planned route, but had decided to keep on looking and happened to find me shortly after I began trying to hitch a ride. There was a Super 8 Motel at the north end of Westmorland, and when Jennifer dropped me off (complete with bananas, trail mix, water, juice and a donation - what a sweetheart!) I discovered i had left my walking stick and water bottle belt clip back at the Border Patrol station. I asked Jennifer to stop on her way back and tell the agents I'd get them in the morning, and we said our goodbyes.

The Super 8 was a very, very welcome respite. Got something to eat, washed my socks and soaked in a hot tub for a while - and got some very, very welcome sleep.

In the morning I needed to find a way back up to the Border Patrol station to retrieve my walking stick and belt clip and begin from where I left off. Since I would be coming right back past the motel again, I asked if I could leave a major portion of my gear there until I returned. No problem. The
woman working at the Shell station across the street was a tremendous help. Most of the people coming through a six in the morning were Hispanic, headed out for work - and I hate to admit that my Spanish is pretty much limited to Hola, taco, and que pasa - so she wound up finding a ride for me with Geraldo and Felipe, brothers headed to L.A. in a semi to pick up a load. They thought it was a wonderful thing I was doing and refused when I offered to pay them for taking me to the station.

When I got there my walking stick was right inside the door, but my water bottle clip was nowhere to be seen - and I entered a period of deep mourning. This little clip is about the neatest, most useful little piece of gear I've ever encountered. It slide over your belt and a standard water bottle snaps into it at the neck, so you have a bottle of water right at hand at all times. I've tried for years to find more of the same with no luck, and have zealously guarded this one - and now it's gone. I managed to get a rare cell phone signal and updated Jonna on my progress...and also bemoaned the loss of my bottle clip. Within fifteen minutes she called me back and told me she had found them on the internet! I had tried many times in the past to no avail, but she found it right away - what a woman!

That brightened my day, along with a good night's rest, nice cool temperatures and no more clouds of dust and grit. I got in touch with Sue and Bob, who wanted to have breakfast with me tomorrow and walk with me a bit, and then got a call from Eric Galvan, a reporter for the Imperial Valley Press, who wanted to catch me for an interview. He caught up to me at the point where I made it back to the Shell station I had set out from early in the morning, and we sat and talked while I let my poor feet air out and changed my socks and shoes. When I set out again, his photographer, Temo,
found me at the south edge of Westmorland and took a bunch of pictures.

I was more than ready to call it quits after 21.8 miles today when Bob found me at the west edge of Brawley and carted me home. A bite to eat, a nice, hot bath, and I feel almost like I could do it all over again. But I think I'll wait until morning.

I haven't said much in all of this about peoples' reactions, but that's because they have been so completely and surprisingly consistent. With the sole exception of the one defeatist border agent, everyone has been so positive, so excited, so completely supportive of what I'm doing that I can
hardly believe it! I see a spark of hope in the eye of each and every person I talk to and I cannot get over how gracious people have been. I really am at a loss for words, except to throw a far less than adequate Thank You out there to everyone I've met over the past several days.

I'll be heading into the dunes area tomorrow - what Jonna calls the "real" desert - and undoubtedly will find myself out of communication for a while again, but don't give up on me - I'll be back on a computer and into the journal again as soon as I possibly can. Over a hundred miles as of today -
Outstanding!

November 12: I'll go into more detail when I get back to computer access again, but for now I'm on the road and my daughter Becky is posting this for me, so I don't want to work her to hard. My health is fine, my feet are beginning to toughen up a bit, but now I'm dealing with a heavy backpack and my shoulders are feeling it. I made 12.1 miles on Saturday and spent my first night under the stars. Watched Orion travel across the sky through the night. I made 14.1 miles today - my best yet - and may make it to Brawley tomorrow. Tonight (Sunday) I hold up in a Super 8 motel in Westmorland working out some of my kinks and tomorrow morning will return to where I left off at the junction of Routes 78 and 86 to begin another day. Thanks go out to Duncan, Andrew and Heather, and Jennifer, who came along at precisely the right instant today. Good Karma, I guess. I'll fill in the details as soon as possible.

November 10: (Late) Well, thanks to Bill Foote I now have some quality backpacking and sleeping gear - as opposed to the $2 (I’m not kidding) backpack I started out with that I got from the Goodwill thrift store a couple of years back. We’ve loaded me down like a pack mule and it’s going to be, um, interesting to see how I cope with the additional weight. Now that I won’t be returning home for many days I have to pack enough clothes and gear to see me through the long run and as much as we’ve tried to keep it light, it’s still a decent load.

Up until now I’ve been able to personally reply to every email and personally thank everyone for their donations. I hope everyone will understand that this is not going to be the case for a while. I will be out of cell phone range most of the way through until Yuma and will of course have no computer connections. Jonna went through a quick course with me tonight on updating the Journal and the Route, but please don’t be alarmed or upset if for the next little while you don’t hear from me or see much change here. People have been so supportive and so generous and I really feel bad about not being able to communicate quickly and directly, but that’s going to have to be part of this for a while. Just know that your support, your encouragement and your donations are all priceless to us. At the very least I’m going to try to get information to Jonna each evening about where I’ve stopped, how many miles I’ve traveled, and when I’ll begin the next day. Jonna is talking about coming out to drag me back home for a break somewhere around the 20^th, but we’ll see how that goes.

Some great good news today. First of all, Dwane Brown from KPBS, the local NPR radio station, called for another interview which will air on Monday. He is planning to continue these throughout my trip. Then, representatives of Peace Pilgrim contacted me to see if I would consider carrying her message along with me as I walk. I would be more than honored. Details will come later. Then, a reporter from the L.A. Times called and wanted to know about doing a story on my walk. He was very enthusiastic and promised he would be pitching it to his editors. Jonna was thrilled when she heard this - and she was even more thrilled when she heard the next one - a reporter from CNN also called and was also excited about doing a story! Wow! And all of that within about 3 hours this afternoon! We had hoped that at some point during my walk we might attract some significant media curiosity, but we both figured it wouldn’t be happening until I was five hundred to a thousand miles down the road. If it’s happening this quickly, we may have something on our hands here that will be much, much bigger than we ever dreamed it would be. Let’s hope so. I hope that our voice will be so loud and our numbers will be so many by the time I reach Washington that our leadership will have no choice but to listen - and to act.

Until I am able to get back here again or post directly, please keep Jonna in your thoughts and your prayers, keep on working for the changes we know must come, and I offer you my profound gratitude, and Peace.

November 10: When I was in my twenties I kept a fresh water aquarium that brought me great pleasure. I worked for a long time to establish a community aquarium, which held a wide variety of different species of fish that could get along together in one tank without thinking of each other as lunch.

I wanted desperately to be able to include a Beta in my aquarium. For those unfamiliar with Betas, they are also called Siamese Fighting Fish. They are gorgeous fish with long, elegant fins and coloration that ranges from bright reds and vermilions through royal blues and purples - certainly one of the most beautiful fish in existence. The trouble is, they live up to their name - Betas do not get along together, to say the least. If placed in the same tank, they will often fight until one of them is dead. But I thought I might have a chance if I could put just a single Beta in my community tank. Perhaps he could coexist with the variety of species around him.

So I bought a Beta, a truly majestic, stunningly beautiful fish with fins like velvet curtains flowing around his sleek body. And I placed him in my aquarium, watching him carefully. At first I had high hopes that my experiment might be successful, because the rest of the fish in the aquarium generally ignored him and went about their own business. But before very long a problem began to develop - not with the other fish, but with the Beta.

He would approach another fish in the aquarium, nose to nose. Then he would puff out his gills, unfurl his majestic fins, and make himself appear as large as possible in what was an unmistakable display of threat. I remember one swordtail in particular that he seemed to have a grudge against. When this happened, the swordtail would simply back away from this grandiose display and swim to the other side of the aquarium. The Beta would stop his display and begin looking around for another fish to intimidate. But while this was going on and the Beta was searching for another target, the swordtail would flash across the aquarium, zip up behind the Beta, and take a good chunk out of one of his fins. By the time the Beta turned around to see what had hit him, the swordtail was long gone - and wouldn’t bother him again until the Beta confronted him once again with another belligerent display - and the process would repeat itself.

Within a few short hours I had to rescue a bedraggled, tattered Beta from the tank and put him in a little bowl all his own for the sake of his very survival. While he may have been beautiful, the poor fish was dumber than a bag of wet mice, unable to realize that he was his own worst enemy.

November 9: A final note for tonight before I get some much needed rest. I am more than a bit concerned that since the majority in both the House and the Senate shifted to Democratic control on Tuesday, many people will begin to relax, confident that things will rapidly and dramatically change, and that things like what I’m doing won’t seem quite as crucial anymore. I beg of you, Don’t! Harken back just a few short months to the Abramoff lobbying scandal. Recall the outraged voices from both sides of the aisle bellowing that lobbying reform must happen NOW. What happened? Exactly nothing. The moment the eye of the public - our eye - was distracted by the next bright, shiny scandal or crisis, the entire subject was quietly shelved and our civil servants went about business (or lack of it) as usual.

Fact is, our entire leadership at this point will take the sum total of public apathy, indifference or inattention and multiply it a hundredfold. No matter who is in charge. If we want changes - if we want to reassemble our Constitution and reclaim our civil rights - then we must hold their feet to the fire daily. As much as our leadership has failed us, we have failed them. Remember, it is We the People who run this country; the people we elect are only there to carry out our wishes. And if we do not make our wishes clear and do not continually demand performance we have, in the end, only ourselves to blame. We have been quiet for far too long, cowed by the Orwellian bullying that dissent is unpatriotic - even treasonous. We must now avoid at all costs fading into the background once again lulled by the delusion that our leaders will do the "right thing" without any further vigilance on our part. Please don’t let that happen. Keep on speaking out. Keep on working for the changes that must be made. And I’ll keep on walking.

November 9: I want to get one thing out of the way first: Just before I left for yesterday’s walk I received another of the few hate mails that have come my way. Since this one involves - as I see it - a direct threat, I wanted to publish the email here...and my response to it. Here’s the email:

Mike Fitzpatrick temp@san.rr.com You are Naive and you are Wrong. We're fortunate to live in a country where you can pursue your dreams and speak your mind. If it turns out that there is an attack on Americans or our allies and it came about in part because the terrorists were emboldened by people like you...I WILL HOLD YOU PERSONALLY ACCOUNTABLE!

Yes, we are indeed fortunate to live in a country where you can pursue your dreams and speak your mind. That's why I'm walking - I want to keep it that way. Have you read any of what I've had to say about why I'm walking? Today's [Nov. 8] entry would be a good start. As far as my being naive and wrong, your saying so doesn't, I'm afraid, make it so. If you want to mount a good argument for that position I'm willing to listen. If all you want to do is make declarations you might as well save your breath. And as for being attacked again - we will. Sooner or later. Neither party, no person and no measure we can take can prevent that. Reduce the chances a bit for a while, yes - but prevent it, no. Get used to it. It's called life. It involves risk. And the more our actions in the world piss the rest of the world off, the higher the risk. Finally, you certainly give me far more credit for having power to "embolden" (talk about a word right out of the talking points!) someone than I think I possess. If you're going to hold me accountable for the next attack against us, is it OK if I hold you accountable for the next thousand of our sons and daughters to die in Iraq?

There you go, Mike. Maybe a little more exposure than you anticipated but hey, if you want to write nastygrams I figure you should at least have the backbone to own up to them.

Sorry I’ve been out of contact for a bit, but that’s going to happen once in a while now that my walk is taking me farther away from the house. Tonight I’ll see if I can catch up. Yesterday (Wed. Nov. 8) Jonna was deep into a nasty stomach flu when we got up in the morning, so we changed our plans just a bit. I drove myself up to my starting point just outside Julian and parked the Jeep, then began my walk. Kim Gordon, who lives on Banner Grade, had offered me a place to stay that evening and I figured when he caught up to me later in the day and I finished my walk, he could take me back to the start, we could retrieve the Jeep, then drive down to his place for the evening.

Kim caught up to me a couple of miles east of Julian and we walked down to his place together, enjoying a great conversation as we went. We stopped and had a bit of lunch when we got to his place - cheese quesadillas and Banner apples (small Fujis locally grown). After lunch I continued down Banner Grade to finish my walk for the day while Kim went to retrieve his truck from where he had met up with me.

Banner Grade is a picturesque, switchback-laden descent of nearly 4,000 feet from the alpine forests surrounding Julian to the stark, rocky Anza-Borrego desert. It is one of my all-time favorite roads and I had been looking forward to walking it. The previous day’s climb up into Julian was probably one of the most grueling stretches - terrain-wise - I’ll face during the entire trip. Wednesday’s walk was nowhere near as difficult, but no less hard on the feet. Going downhill, the pressure just works on different parts of the foot and I wound up with impressive blisters on the bottom edge of both heels. They don’t hurt nearly as bad - and won’t hinder me as much - as the one I developed on the sole of my left foot, but I’m still a long way from toughening up like I need to.

I told Kim where I expected to end for the day and he caught up with me just before I got there - Scissors Crossing, where S2 meets route 78 at the western edge of the Anza-Borrego. We drove back up through Julian to fetch my Jeep, then Kim took me to the home of his friend, James Hubble, who is a world-renown artist/architect. What a fantastic place! James was there so I had the pleasure of meeting him and took lots of pictures. I’ve got to get Jonna up there because this is the kind of stuff she dreams of. Kim is a stone mason and has worked with James on a number of projects over the years.

Don Day had been trying to catch me all day, but I had been in the land of no cell phone coverage. When we were approaching Julian to get my Jeep, suddenly cell phone coverage kicked in and I got Don’s messages. We wound up missing him by less than five minutes. I’m sure he enjoyed his slice of Julian apple pie anyway.

It was dark by the time we got back to Kim’s and while he was feeding Bear and Nettie, his two dogs, I suddenly developed an intense chill. I bedded down early under a huge down comforter, but it wasn’t until after 10:30 in the evening that I was able to get warm again.

Thursday morning Kim and I drove into the Anza-Borrego twelve miles past Scissors Crossing to a point about ten miles west of Ocotillo Wells. I parked the Jeep there and Kim drove me back to Scissors Crossing, where we said goodby for now. I was committed now - I had to walk twelve miles today if I wanted to get to my Jeep! Another fine day and an easy walk, not withstanding the less than perfect feet. About four miles into the walk I came across Jim and Christie, a young couple who were looking for fossils and minerals. They reminded me of myself a few years ago when I didn’t know my agate from my quartz. I gave them some tips on where to find neat stuff in the Anza-Borrego and they asked me where I was headed. I told them Washington D.C. Everyone thinks I’m kidding the first time I say it. Once they discovered I was serious - and why I was walking - they were very enthusiastic and we talked for a short time before parting.

I stopped at a rest area where the road splits off to head north toward Borrego Springs and I would continue east toward Ocotillo Wells. It was a little past the halfway point and it was time to change socks and shoes and cool off a bit. A gentleman by the name of Herb Stone passed by and asked the regulation question to which I gave the regulation answer - and we sat and talked for a while. Herb is a retired school teacher from Borrego Springs and is going to try to find someone who can put me up for the night after the next leg of my walk. Before I resumed my walk, Herb went back to his car and returned with a donation for my walk.

Back to the road. At about the nine mile point a white pickup pulled up across the highway from me. The driver asked, "Are you Bill McDannell?" I replied, "Yes, sir, I am." He gave me a big smile, got out of his truck and came over to meet me. His name was Wes Fleming, and he had been driving around for some time trying to find me. I was farther down the road than he expected me to be. He asked if he could join me and I told him sure, so we walked along through the desert, talking all the while. Wes is trying to arrange his schedule so he will be able to meet up with me and walk with me on some future legs of my journey.

The Jeep’s odometer must be a bit off, because it wound up being 13 miles rather than 12. I hope Wes wasn’t too worn out. I drove him back to his truck, he also handed me a generous donation, and I headed back home.

The people I have been meeting have been nothing short of fantastic, and their enthusiasm for what I’m doing is continually inspiring. Each day I am reassured that I am not only doing what I must do, but what must be done. I can’t do justice to each of these wonderful souls here in the journal, but I hope each of them knows how deeply they have touched my heart and that, together, we will accomplish much.

I am home tonight (the 9^th) and am taking a one-day break from my walk to get some things done around here before I head out again. I hope everyone will understand that for the foreseeable future my journal posting may be irregular, because I will be away from home and will be in areas where there will likely be no cell phone coverage. But I will do my absolute best to at least post on the Route page where I expect to be starting from the next day and how far I plan to walk. For tonight, I’ll get this posted, answer a few emails and get some rest.

November 8: (Very early) I have been saying there’s a change in the air - I think yesterday bore that out pretty well. I wanted to say something this morning regarding a topic I’ve touched on before, but I want to try to be clear.

People have asked what I’ll do if the changes I seek happen before I arrive in Washington. My answer has been that I’ll continue to walk. That’s because when I am asked this, it is usually by someone who has concluded that my walk is about ending the wars and getting our sons and daughters home. It’s easy to see how people draw this conclusion, especially with the title I’ve chosen for my effort.

But the ending of the wars and the return of our troops is an (inevitable) effect of what I seek to accomplish, and while it is certainly central to why I am doing this, the underlying motivation has a bit broader focus. You see, I don’t just want to end these wars, but I want to help to move our country into a position that will make it far less likely that we will ever do something this stupid, this arrogant, this irresponsible again. While ending these wars will be an incredible step in the right direction, it will do us little good in the long run unless we use this opportunity to examine ourselves in a mirror, unflinchingly discover who we have become, and remember who it is we believe ourselves to be and want ourselves to be in the world.

After September 11^th, we lashed out in a blind, vengeful rage. Perhaps that was understandable, and I think the world in general even understood for a while. But over five years later, we’re still stuck in that mindless rage and the world is losing or has lost its patience with us. And we still don’t seem to get it. Last night while watching the returns, I heard yet another politician - I don’t remember who or even what party (could have been either one) - declare (I paraphrase), "Islamofascism is the biggest threat the world faces today". It is not - by a long shot. It is not even the biggest threat our country faces - by a long shot. And that statement only serves to illustrate that the fundamental changes I hope to see are still far from our grasp.

Because what I hope to see is a country that is proactive rather than reactive. I hope to see a country where consideration for the consequences of our actions comes before we take those actions rather than afterward. I hope to see a country where feel-good phrases and nationalistic declarations of bravado are immediately viewed with a huge degree of skepticism rather than a frightened herd mentality. I hope to see a country that is finally able to swallow its overblown pride and take its rightful place as a nation among nations, rather than continue to act out its self-destructive fantasy that it is a nation above nations. I hope to see a nation that learns the clear lesson of the entire history of human existence that when you put yourself (or others put you) on a pedestal, the ultimate effect is that it makes you an easy target and the ultimate desire of those looking up at you is to knock you down. I hope to see a country that realizes that there is no longer any culture on earth that is a world away - but that they are all now quite literally our next door neighbors. I hope to see a country that understands that an apology or an admission of a mistake is not a sign of weakness, but rather an indication of maturity, wisdom and strength.

Lofty goals, to be sure. But the world in which we now live demands that we seek them if we wish to survive and thrive. You see, I have no doubt that our country will be attacked again. No matter who is in power, no matter how much of our rights and our freedoms we decide to sacrifice in the empty pursuit of security, no matter how much we may wish it would not be so, we will be attacked again. And when we are, if we react as insanely as we did this time, there won’t be much of anything left at the other end that will be recognizable as the United States of America, because we will have eaten ourselves alive. That’s why my principle goals in walking are broader than what most people assume, and to state specifically what those goals are:

(1) To restore the balance of power between our branches of government so that we will be bound to act in the fashion our Constitution and Bill of Rights intends.

(2) To closely examine what has happened over the past five years so that when the next disaster happens we are ready to deal with it responsibly and effectively.

(3) To be true to our vision of ourselves, even when our outrage tempts us to allow the actions of others to change our self-determination of who we are.

So here’s the thing: If you disagree with me, this is what you’re disagreeing with. You say you support the present state of things? That you are convinced that the very continuation of civilization hinges upon whether or not we "win" these "wars"? You have the right to believe that. What you do not have the right to do, in my opinion, is to demolish the very soul of this nation in order to achieve your ends. If you are going to fight a perpetual war against a phantom enemy, then you must find a way to do it that is permissible under the laws that form the framework of our society - otherwise, you wind up destroying the very thing you seek to preserve. Changing our laws, changing our Constitution, nullifying our rights in order to achieve your purposes are not acceptable courses of action. If you cannot find a way to accomplish your objectives while simultaneously keeping our representative democracy intact, then you cannot continue to pursue your goals and call yourself a patriot. What comes first in your mind? Your patriotism or your rage? Your allegiance to freedom or your desire for vengeance? If you want to preserve this country for your children, then you MUST demand that it behaves - at all times - in a manner consistent with its own principles. And since these are my stated underlying goals, if you agree with them, you have no argument with me. I’m sorry if this does not permit you to continue to act out your anger and your fear, but it’s time for us to grow up. We cannot continue to be America if we do not act like America.

November 7: We got up early and went to vote before Jonna hauled me out to today’s starting point. When I arrived, I was met by Laurel and Janet, who would be walking part of the way with me today, and Kathy and Cindy, who had stopped (they were bicycling) to talk with Laurel and Janet while they were waiting for me and found out about my walk. They decided to wait around to meet me and wish me well. This evening I got a wonderful email from Cindy, who has told all her friends about my walk.

Laurel and Janet and I began the walk up route 78 toward Julian and talked about all sorts of things. Laurel had brought some coffee cake for me. Besides the obvious, we talked about Alzheimer’s, which is a familiar topic for me. Jonna’s mother lived with us for the past eight years and we cared for her through progressively deteriorating Alzheimer’s until she died just a bit over a year ago. Janet mentioned that she and her husband had recently published a historical fiction novel, "Follow the Sun", which was a San Diego Book Awards winner last year, so when I got to Wynola Road, I stopped in the Books In Nooks store there and bought a (signed) copy. I’m sure both Jonna and I will love it. Jonna is a truly world-class reader, devouring books like most people down popcorn.

We were soon joined by their friend Mary, who brought a dayglo vest for me. I thanked her for it, but I’m using it more like a flag as I walk the sometimes very narrow shoulders of route 78. I’m sticking as much as possible to my white long-sleeved shirt, jeans and hat as a "uniform" so people who are looking for me will be able to find me. After about three miles or so, Laurel, Janet and Mary had to turn back, so we said our goodbyes and I continued on into Santa Ysabel by my lonesome.

Just before Santa Ysabel, Shirley, who had walked with me yesterday, caught up to me again with her son. They went on into Santa Ysabel to wait for me, then Shirley joined me for the arduous trek up into Julian.

Since I stopped a bit short of my goal yesterday to care for my foot, I doubted that I could make the entire walk to Julian I had originally planned. My foot was feeling almost back to normal today, but I didn’t want to push too hard, especially since the grade up to Julian is probably one of the hardest I will face in the entire trip. Shirley and I took several short breaks. The weather, as usual, was wonderful and there was a slight breeze to help keep us cool. I had told Jonna to plan to leave home at 1:30, figuring she would catch up to me to pick me up around 2:30. It was a pretty accurate estimate. She found us about a mile and a half short of Julian, and I decided that this was good enough, since it made my distance for the day about twelve miles and my foot still needs a bit more recuperation. Within minutes of Jonna’s arrival, Shirley’s husband also showed up, so we said goodbye and headed home.

I stopped on the way to pick up my new glasses - just in time! These have just about everything you can put in a pair of glasses - Transitions lenses, graduated bifocal, anti-glare coating, scratch resistant coating, bucket seats...well, maybe not bucket seats. I’ve been needing a new pair for quite some time, and I had ordered them before my insurance disappeared when I left my job.

Tonight will be almost my last night at home for some time to come. I say "almost" because I’m going to take Friday off from my walk to get a few things done around here before I get too far from home. But tomorrow night I’ve been offered accommodations near the bottom of Banner grade, and from that point on - with the exception of Friday - I’m going to be on my own for about the next month and a half or so until Jonna and the guys (Finn & Spoof) can join me. This will mean that the number of miles I cover each day and the places I stop along the way are going to be uncertain for a while. But I’m going to try to update - through Becky - my position as precisely as possible each day so people know where they can find me. I’ve also modified the Route page so people can keep track of my mileage each day and the total miles covered on my trip. I also plan to start carrying my GPS with me so I can give coordinates for those of you so equipped. That’s it for tonight. On through Julian and down into the Anza-Borrego desert tomorrow!

November 6: (Later) Every day I am overwhelmed by the thoughtfulness, sincerity and insight of the people I have been meeting. Our hearts have been filled to the brim so many times already that the entire journey has already been made more than worthwhile for both Jonna and myself. This morning our realtor, Ann (and I’m going to stop calling her that, because she has become such a precious and supportive friend that I do a disservice to her calling her "our realtor") and her husband, Rich drove me to Ramona to begin today’s leg, as Jonna was busy tending to one of her home health care people. While we were waiting for 9 a.m. to arrive, Dave Patterson from VFP showed up, then a dear lady named Jean, who drove up from Coronado to walk with me today, arrived. Ann joined us through Ramona, then had to leave with Rich. As we Jean and I were leaving Ramona, Shirley joined us - she had brought me some "Sport Bean" jelly beans (which were delicious!) and some protein bars.

We walked on toward Old Julian Highway and had a wonderful conversation. But my foot was already killing me so the going was pretty slow. Shirley soon departed, promising to catch up to me later in the day. Jean walked on with me for about the first five miles, but then had to turn back as she had no arrangements for transportation at the other end. Jean and I would have gone farther together, but by that time I was walking like a little old man - very slow pace.

When Jean left I found myself alone for the first time in my walk. I love to have people with me to talk to and share ideas, but I also enjoy the solo time...except I wasn’t sure how much longer my foot would hold out. I started marking progress by the little half-mile markers along the road and took a few breaks along the way. I didn’t know how the mile markers related to the distance I had traveled (I’m going to have to start remembering to bring my GPS with me!), but by the time I hit the 5.5 marker I was sorely tempted to call Jonna and call it quits for today. But I rested for a while and then decided to see if I could hit one more mile marker...then another.

Before I could, a white pickup pulled alongside me and the driver asked, "Are you the man walking across the country?" I replied, "Yes sir, I am." He introduced himself to me - his name was Earl. He had heard about my walk on KLSD, the local Air America station. He told me he’d offer me a lift, but that would probably be cheating. I agreed that it would, and we laughed - although with my feet feeling the way they did it was certainly tempting! He told me that if there was anything he could do to help to just let him know, then handed me a donation. I keep meeting people like Earl - it’s wonderful.

Shortly after that, Shirley’s husband drove by and introduced himself and let me know that Shirley would be back soon. By the time I hit the 6 mile marker Shirley arrived (her son drove her there) and we set off together for however much of my planned walk I could accomplish.

As Shirley and I walked and talked, suddenly something very strange happened - nearly all of the pain disappeared from my left foot and I could walk almost normally again. I didn’t say anything to Shirley, but I could walk at a near-normal pace and it didn’t feel like someone was driving nails into the bottom of my foot anymore. Before long, we came in sight of route 78, which I knew put me within about a mile and a half of my intended goal for the day. I had gone much farther than I thought I could.

As we approached route 78, a young woman named Cheryl walked up to meet us. She had driven up from Kensington to join me on my walk. The three of us continued the short distance to route 78, where I decided to end for the day - my foot was feeling much better, but I didn’t want to press my luck any more for the day. Cheryl wound up driving me back into Ramona where Jonna would come to pick me up. We talked along the way, and Cheryl wants to join me for more of the walk.

I wound up coming home feeling one hundred percent better than I did after yesterday’s walk, confident that my foot is on the mend, and having had the terrific experience of making several new friends. This is going to be one terrific journey!

November 6: Way too early in the morning. Just a quick note to let everyone know that Bob Davis has posted a short video of the beginning of my walk at http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3412738688971026488 It's just me rambling a bit before I start, but I truly appreciate Bob capturing it and putting it online. Also wanted to let everyone know that I'm going to try to tough it out, but I fear that if my foot doesn't improve today or the new shoes and socks don't help, it may slow me down considerably today or, worse yet, may cause me to have to take a break for a day much, much earlier than I anticipated. I really don't want that to happen, and really hope everyone will understand if it does. Don't worry, though - it will not stop me. And other than the foot, I feel absolutely fine.

Another beautiful day with the companionship of some fantastic people on the way to Ramona. When we made it into town there was a small group waiting to welcome me, which surprised and moved me. Ina traveled all the way from Los Angeles to walk with me today. She is another dear soul who has experienced oppression first hand (she is from the Basque region of Spain) and is deeply concerned about the path down which our country is headed. Don followed along to offer support today in his motorhome and his daughter walked with us. As we entered Ramona, two young girls had parked and were waiting for us - they wanted to have their picture taken with me! I’m never quite prepared for that sort of response.

Today’s trek took quite a toll on my feet again, so immediately afterward Jonna and I headed to REI to pick up some more serviceable shoes and socks. I feel much better prepared now. There’s a huge blister on my left foot in the middle just in back of my toes. I know my feet will toughen up quickly, but I’m concerned that this is going to slow me down a bit over the next few days. I hope the new socks and shoes will help.

I also have to watch my nutrition. I have no trouble taking in enough liquids, but exercise works as an appetite suppressant for me and I need to eat something more often. I wound up light-headed this evening until Jonna forced some food into me. I’m truly blessed to have her watching over me.

I received a very saddening email from someone calling herself Army mom this evening, who is going to pray to God that my journey is difficult and completely unsuccessful. She has become convinced that the enemies we’ve made "hate our religion and our freedom". Not that I think it will do any good, but I did my best to respond to her. Of all the egregious things the OOOO has done, I think that possibly the most loathsome has been to portray what’s going on as a religious war. This may be the single greatest damage he has done - and the one that will take the longest time to heal.

November 4: The weather was stunning, but the people were incredible. As far as I know, nobody did a head count - but there were somewhere between eighty and a hundred people who showed up to see me off on my journey. There were smiles, there were tears, there were so many people who understand what terrible danger our country is in right now and want desperately to turn it around. Two television stations and two newspapers were represented - including Mike from the UT (who did the first article on my walk), who brought his wife and their child along. I met many friends I’ve encountered before and many brand new friends. Don Day was there and announced that he was officially firing his representative (Duncan Hunter) and appointing me to replace him. Don gave me his dogtags, which I will wear throughout the walk.

It was a morning I will never forget. About forty or fifty people began the walk with me shortly after nine. About a dozen made it all the way, including my daughter, Kari. Her daughter was crestfallen that she didn’t quite make the entire distance - she took a couple of miles off with Jonna past the middle of the walk but rejoined us to complete it. She walked seven miles. She’s ten years old. Believe me, we let her know how proud we are of her.

I suffered minimal damage. The forward part of the sole of my right foot is suffering tonight, but it should probably be fine by morning and the next leg from Poway Road into Ramona. Jonna and I had planned to take bunches of pictures today, but in the middle of all the activity neither of us had the opportunity to do it. I know there were many taking pictures, and if you were one, please let me know so that I can get some from you to post here in the journal. Here are a few sent to me by Timothy McIlhenney this evening - thanks Timothy!

The very first steps of the walk - out of Lindo Lake Park and on to Washington, D.C.

Tomorrow I’ll begin again at 9 a.m. from where I left off today - where Poway Road meets route 67 - and walk to downtown Ramona, and when I catch my breath I’ll talk more about the fantastic people I’m meeting along the way, like my old geocaching buddies, Splashman and Splashette. Spread the word - I’ll continue the walk. But for the balance of tonight, some rest.

Oops, almost forgot. I had a small inauguration speech I was planning to give today and did actually use a few parts of it. Here’s the whole of what I wanted to say:

I have been asked by more than one person now if I don’t think that what I am doing is more than just a little bit insane. I have seriously thought about this - I really have. And I would like to answer that question clearly this morning.

No, I do not think what I am doing is insane. Not even a little bit. Unusual, certainly. Radical, perhaps. Drastic, yes. But definitely not insane. In fact, I am certain that what I am doing is one of the most sane things I have ever done in my life.

Thirty-eight years ago I did something similar to this. Thirty-eight years ago I firmly believed that I was truly blessed to live in a country where I had freedom and opportunities available to me that were unparalleled in the history of the world. Thirty-eight years ago I felt that, in return for what I believed would be a lifetime of freedom established by uncommonly wise forebears, endorsed by public approval and continuously guarded by dedicated leadership, giving up four year’s worth of that uncommon freedom in service to my country was not too much to ask. For a time, as a member of the armed forces of my country, I did not have all the rights and freedoms an ordinary citizen had. For a time, I was not permitted to participate fully in the political process, I was not permitted full freedom of choice, or of movement, or of action. These were restrictions I was willing to accept for a time, if they meant that the rest of my life could be lived with the assurance that those freedoms would never be encroached upon again.

But now I realize that the freedoms I expected to be immutable need more diligent protection than I once believed, and the character of the country I cherish requires at times more attention than I expected. Four years were not enough. It is time for me to serve my country again. What I am doing is not the least bit insane. What I am doing, if you want to put a label on it, is patriotic.

I’ll tell you what is insane. The leadership of my country standing in the halls of Congress and debating whether torture - in any form and to any degree - is an acceptable practice is insane. Attempting to eradicate terrorism by continuing to pursue a course of action that demonstrably has the effect of encouraging, producing and even legitimizing more terrorists is insane. Attempting to establish democracies by force is insane. Refusing to attempt to communicate with those we fear may have a desire to harm us is insane. The idea that the Congress of my country would one day pass - and the president of my country would one day sign into law - legislation that immediately and completely nullifies nearly every right guaranteed to me as a citizen under the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights is insane. Declaring war against an idea is insane. Executing a pre-emptive strike against a country - any country, for any reason - is insane. Not holding accountable a leadership that, on pretense, drove my country into a war that has so far claimed the lives of three thousand of our sons and daughters and half a million or more foreign lives and by its very definition has no set of circumstances that could be defined as a victory nor any parameters that could be established as an end is insane. The fact that there aren’t already tens of millions of my fellow citizens walking to Washington D.C. to demand that our leadership returns to the employment of rationality and reason in administering the affairs of our nation and restores the country we entrusted into their hands is insane.

At this very moment, the country I love so dearly, the country I had hoped to leave to my children and grandchildren as their birthright, no longer exists. But I will not let go of her easily. I will do whatever I can, whatever I must, to reclaim her. I will make whatever sacrifice is necessary. I have felt powerless, voiceless, disenfranchised for too long, and I know that many, many of my neighbors have felt the same way. They have come to believe that they don’t matter - that those who hold power have become too powerful, that the route to reclaiming what we cherish is too difficult, that one person - even one person who truly cares - cannot make a difference. And that is why I am walking. I am walking to show my friends and neighbors that one person can be heard. I am walking to demonstrate that it is still possible to speak truth to power. I am walking to illustrate that each and every one of us can indeed make a difference. I am walking because I believe that the greatest threat to the security and continuity of my country is no longer from without - it is now from within. I am walking to pry my country out of the hands of those who would quench her beacon of freedom and mutilate the image, esteem and promise she has represented for generations to the entire world. I am walking as a patriot.

As I am walking, don’t wave your flag in my face and mouth senseless slogans to me. Instead, remember what the country you love - if you love her - stood for, and look around you at what she has now become. Think about what is happening. Think about what our actions - and our inactions - are telling the rest of the world about us. Think about whether or not you want your children - and their children - to be blessed with the freedoms you always assumed would be theirs as a matter of course. They will not, unless you have the courage to do what you can, to do what you must, to make it so.

I am beginning my walk today, and as I do, I am serving notice to the public servants - the members of Congress, the president and the vice president - to whom I have granted by my vote the temporary authority to manage the affairs of my country. I am serving notice that I demand that the wounds inflicted upon my country by their inattention to their duties and their inability or unwillingness to execute the powers of their offices with honesty, vision, courage and transparency be healed and corrected. It only took a few months for them to be coerced, misled and duped into a course of action that is rapidly unraveling the very fabric of our nation. I am giving them much more than that length of time to figure out a way to undo the damage they have done. I want my country back, and despite their continuing actions that indicate to me a general inability to even recognize the severity of the problem, I am willing to give them several more months to restore her to me.

When I reach Washington D.C. I will have accomplished what I set out to do. But whether I realize the goals I am setting for the restoration of these United States is going to depend not on the willingness of our leadership to hear me, but rather on how many of you will join your voices with mine, how many of you will do what you can do - and what you know you must do - to reclaim our country. Whether or not we ever see our beloved country again will depend on whether or not we are willing to join our voices together to make a statement so loud and so determined that our leadership will no longer be capable of ignoring or dismissing us. Whether or not I realize the goals I have set will depend entirely on how many patriots we have left.

...Jonna's on her way to get the coffepots, I'm busy getting the front end of the house painted - and we're ready to hit the road. See you at the park tomorrow morning - directions are below.

I’ve mentioned it before but I’ll mention it once more - I am trying like anything to respond to every email I’ve received, but if you haven’t heard from me I sincerely apologize. First of all, it may well mean we didn’t get the email, because we’re still having the corrupted email problem, and second of all, with the volume of correspondence we’ve received there may sometimes be one I miss. Remember, this is just me and Jonna doing this. And once I start walking on Saturday, Jonna will be doing the bulk of the correspondence - and since she has an allergic reaction to the computer (she breaks out in anger) things may get backed up a bit.

Also, we have had a number of occasions now where someone has sent a donation through the Paypal button, the donation is recorded in our Paypal account, but for some reason Paypal has not sent us an email that the donation has been made. Again, I think I’ve caught them all so far, but if you send a donation and I don’t acknowledge it, don’t hesitate to write and ask if we received it. Your generosity is more than deeply appreciated and we want to let each and every person who makes a donation know that personally.

Some information about Saturday morning, which I’ll also try to post in the journal tomorrow. Lindo Lake Park is easy to find, but here’s some quick directions:

Coming from route 67: exit at Mapleview to the east. Turn right immediately onto Maine St. Go to the first stop light (Woodside) and turn left. The park will be directly in front of you and we’ll be meeting at the baseball field (we hope), which will be directly ahead of you. You’ll have to go through one stop sign at the corner where the post office is (one block), then jog right and left to the entrance to the park.

Coming from Interstate 8: Exit at the El Cajon 2^nd street exit and head north on 2^nd street. It eventually becomes Wintergarden, and a couple miles later, after you pass Albertson’s, it intersects with Woodside. Turn right on Woodside. Continue on Woodside through two more traffic lights and past the post office to the stop sign. Then follow the directions above.

Exit at Los Coches Road and head north (away from WalMart...of course). Los Coches Road becomes Maine Street (don’t turn on Main St. - that takes you to El Cajon). When you get to Woodside, turn right and follow the directions above.

Some preliminary instructions for the day of the walk: We have absolutely no idea whether one hundred or one thousand people are going to show up, and we’re a bit nervous about that. After about a month’s worth of calls to CHP, various Sheriff’s departments and Caltrans, just this week we finally got in touch with a fine gentleman at the San Diego county roads department who could give us the straight scoop. He says that we have every right to walk along the roadway without having to obtain any sort of permits, permissions or other authorizations - AS LONG AS we do so without causing a hindrance to traffic. That means that if you want to walk with me, we must stay on the shoulder of the road. It’s alright to carry a sign if that’s your thing. If we wind up with a large crowd, I’m going to be asking for a few volunteers to act as monitors for about every 20-25 participants we have, just to make sure it goes smoothly. If you are planning to drive along as an escort for some people who are walking, you cannot pace the walk (that would be considered to be causing an obstruction to traffic) - you must leap-frog - drive a mile or half mile ahead and find a place to park until we catch up with you, then do it again. We expect to have at least two vehicles doing that just in case someone has a problem along the way. These vehicles will have extra water supplies (bring water if you’re going to walk!), protein bars, first aid supplies and so forth. In the park before the walk, Jonna and our daughter Kari will have coffee, tea, hot chocolate and muffins - hopefully enough for anyone who would like some. Remember that if you plan to walk, you need to make arrangements to get from wherever you stop walking to wherever you want to go from there.

Today I met a fine gentleman by the name of Don Day. Don had called me the other day. He was terribly excited about my walk and wanted to meet us. So we drove over to his house this afternoon. Don was quite active in the San Diego political and community activism arena about twenty-five years ago, and he wants more than anything to be my publicist - a desire to which I readily agreed. Actually, I have to correct myself. More than anything, Don wants to walk with me. But he can’t. Don has had a stroke, prostate cancer that should have killed him a couple of years ago, several surgeries, and lung cancer that is killing him. He is essentially constantly attached to a supply of oxygen and extremely limited in his mobility. Last week, he came down with the flu, which he figured would be the final act. But Sunday, he saw the article about my walk in the paper and decided he wasn’t quite ready to die yet. He told me that he wants my petition and my walk to be the last thing he does. He told me I’m his hero.

As I write this I have to pause. I lack words. It’s hard enough for me to take in the fact that someone considers me to be their hero. I don’t feel like a hero. And to think that Don wants to spend the little time he has left working on promoting my petition and my walk - it’s just more than I can take in. Don will be there Saturday morning in his motorized wheelchair with his oxygen bottle. He even wants to go on part of the walk with us. I hope you’ll have the opportunity to meet him. He is, as I said, a fine gentleman.

November 1: We sort of collapsed today. It began when the guy who was supposed to wash the house for us arrived this morning. I had spent a chunk of the previous evening moving things away from the house so he could wash it, which was no easy task since everything has become pretty well discombobulated with all the swap meets we’d been doing and cleaning up and beginning to pack and so forth. I had left a few small items for first thing in the morning, but he arrived before I could actually get them moved. When he got here, he immediately got all pissy with me because there were still some things that hadn’t been moved. I had also put some large items under a tarp in the middle of the driveway, and this was unacceptable to him. After being as polite as possible while he went into a tirade about how he just couldn’t do the job with all the stuff in his way, I told him, "Let’s just forget it." He told me he’d come back tomorrow if I would get the rest of the stuff moved, but I told him no, we’ll just forget the whole thing.

Fortunately, our realtor, Anne, happened to come by while this was going on. After the guy left, she just looked at me in amazement and told me that it was certainly the last time she’d recommend him to anyone.

But this meant we were down to less than three days before the walk begins and I still had a house to wash and paint. And suddenly I decided that I had been pushing myself too hard. The house doesn’t actually have to be painted until we close at the end of November, and even though I’ll be gone we’ll figure out some way to get it done. Pushing myself to have it done before the walk begins was just stressing me (and Jonna) out and it was time to let go of some of this for now. So we pretty much took the day off today. And it felt good.

The man from Channel 10 came out for an interview at 10 a.m. and wound up staying for two hours. I’m sure he has some particular angle in mind for the report he’ll be doing. It will be interesting to see what it turns out to be. He at first told me it would air this afternoon, but called me later to tell me it won’t air until tomorrow.

Yesterday our district House representative, Duncan Hunter, who is chair of the House Armed Services Committee, announced he’ll be running for president in 2008. That was good for a couple of laughs. Mr. Hunter happens to serve one of the most conservative districts in the entire nation and runs virtually unopposed every election. I guess this has led him to start believing his own press. I can think of no other reason he’d try for the presidency. This morning I read a recent interview with him, and wanted to offer you a portion of what he had to say:

He said, "I think we all generally agree that our campaign in Iraq consists of a three-step process: To establish a free government, which we’ve done, to establish a military that will protect that government, and to leave Iraq. It’s the same pattern we’ve followed in freeing a lot of countries over the last 60 years. It’s so vitally important to remember that if we are successful in Iraq, we will have a government there that is a friend to the United States, a benign one that is not a threat to our nation, and will not be a state sponsor of terrorism. I still believe the American people understand this."

I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this, but there is one portion I wanted to highlight - the observation that "It’s the same pattern we’ve followed in freeing a lot of countries over the last 60 years." Let me see, Mr. Hunter...to which countries do you refer? Perhaps you’re referring to Iran, where we put the Shah into power. That worked out well, didn’t it? Bad example. Oops, sorry. How about The Philippines, where we backed Marcos. No? Well, um, maybe Noriega in Panama? I could go on. No, wait - I know! I know! How about Iraq, where we propped up what’s-his-name...yes, Saddam Hussein! Yes, our success rate has been pretty stunning, Mr. Hunter, and I’m certain we should follow the same pattern we have for the past 60 years - look where it’s gotten us.

It occurred to me quite a while ago that most of our leaders do not really believe in the merits of a democracy. I do. I truly believe that for most (not all) societies, democracy is probably the best, most benign form of government. As a matter of fact, I believe that so resolutely that I believe that most people, given time and the chance, will eventually choose to form some sort of democratic government for themselves. But our leadership seems intent on forcing, by political, economic or military pressure, other countries to establish democracies. And this is why I don’t think they truly believe in the merits of a democracy. If, for example you believed that Fords were the absolute best vehicles on the face of the planet, would you (a) force all your neighbors, by whatever means necessary, to buy a Ford, or (b) demonstrate through superior performance, reliability and service that this was one really great car? How many of your neighbors would be happy or grateful to you if you chose option A? What does option A say about your faith in the merits of the vehicle itself to win others over to it? How many of your neighbors would be so torqued off by your overbearing arrogance and lack of any consideration whatsoever for them that they would swear never to even look at a Ford again, no matter how good it was? Just a thought.

October 31: The website traffic has died down some but still remains strong. Another way too busy day. I began washing the house down in preparation for painting, but it was taking too long, and since many wonderful folks have begun contributing for our walk I decided we could afford to have it power-washed, so the guy is coming to do that tomorrow morning. Then I get to paint. Whoopee. I’ve also been finishing up some interior painting and papering today. I hope to be able to knock off about midnight. Or so. Channel 10 is coming out for another interview tomorrow as well.

I hope to be able to set up a page one day with some of the emails we’ve received from people. I had been working on it before everything broke loose on Sunday, but right now I can’t even give you a good estimate of the number of people who have signed the petition so far because I haven’t been able to keep up with it. It’s all there when I get the time to tabulate it. I do wish you could hear many of the stories that have been shared with me. I received a call this afternoon from Jerry, who is tremendously excited about my walk and wants to be able to help. Jerry, you don’t know how much you’ve helped already. Jerry immigrated to our country forty years ago from a communist held country to escape the oppression and control that dominated his life there. Now, he tells me, America is beginning to feel just like the country he left - and he is way beyond distressed. Are you hearing this, people? Are you listening? Are you paying attention? Are you looking around you? I’ve received a few emails from people quite upset about what I’m doing - talking about how we must defeat the Muslim extremists and wipe out terrorism or they will blow us to smithereens. I have news for those people. If they would just open their eyes a little wider they might suddenly realize that we’re about to save the terrorists the effort. What the terrorists could not hope to do even in their wildest dreams is being done to our democracy by our own leadership and right before our eyes! People who have lived under oppression can see it quite clearly - why can’t we? By the time another terrorist makes it here with a bomb (yes, it will happen - and more sooner than later if we don’t stop breeding them) he may look around when he arrives and say, "Oh, never mind. Mission accomplished," - because there won’t be a democracy left to attack. We have a limited window of opportunity to reclaim our country and rebuild the democracy that we’ve been letting inexorably slip away in our blindness of rage and fear. I’m only hoping that enough of us will wake up in time. As for me, I guess you could think of me as that annoying little alarm clock that’s trying to roust you even when you don’t want to be rousted. But I don’t have a snooze button.

October 30: Just a quick note tonight - the volume of response yesterday and today has had both of us absolutely overwhelmed. While it’s a good problem to have, it has come to my attention that it is possible that some emails that were sent to us never arrived. I have tried desperately to respond to each and every personal email as well as every donation. I think I have gotten everyone, but if you didn’t get a response from me, it is possible I didn’t get your email. The problem we’ve had since the 17^th with corrupted emails has not gone away, but it has lessened. But to my knowledge that problem only affected the petition signing page and not the Contact Us page. Anyway, if you didn’t hear from me, please try again - I may not have received your email.

Still have to finish the kitchen ceiling papering before giving up for tonight - then start on painting the house tomorrow. After this week, walking is going to be a cinch!

October 29: What an absolutely crazy day! But good crazy rather than bad crazy for a change. I got up early this morning and discovered that the San Diego Union Tribune article had been published - a week earlier than we expected. I discovered this not by reading the paper, but by finding that the website statistics were going bonkers. Suddenly we were getting visitors all over the place! And then the phone calls started. The local CBS affiliate came out to do an interview. Three local radio stations called to do interviews. The local Fox affiliate called to do an interview - and since they were very supportive I actually agreed, although they had to cancel. One of the local Hispanic stations emailed to set up an interview. We got our very first donation through the PayPal feature on the website. Then another one - and another one. We began getting dozens of emails from people expressing their support and Jonna and I have spent much of the day with tears in our eyes. Then the house sold! Jonna was literally dancing for joy. I told her that I don’t expect I will ever again see anyone so downright thrilled to suddenly find themselves homeless.

It’s not quite ten p.m. now and so far today we have had over 400 visitors to the website...and people are still logging on. The power of the press. We thought they did a great job with the article in the paper, although they did manage to turn our daughter Kari into a boy. She wasn’t upset. She’s pretty secure in her sexual identity, having had two children of her own now. The interview with CBS was also handled well - we managed to catch both airings of the interview, and noticed that they restructured it the second time around. Jonna was very pleased to see that they gave me more air time than Duncan Hunter. Maybe it was because I had something to say worth listening to. Maybe it was because I’m so darn good looking. Well, maybe not.

I’ve been amazed that we haven’t had more whackos crawling out of the woodwork. We’ve had a few. The worst one so far signed the petition with a few things I suppose he thought were cute, then, apparently unsatisfied with his handiwork, wrote me an email expressing the sincere desire that I get run over by a Greyhound bus during my walk. As long as he isn’t a Greyhound bus driver I really don’t feel terribly intimidated. But I can count the hate mail on one hand and still have fingers left over. The messages of support have been overwhelming. I’ve tried to answer each and every one of them (except the ones that hope I rot in hell - don’t see much point in responding to those) and think I got everyone. There were even a few that disagree with me but wished me well anyway. I hope those will take some time to read my journal and perhaps find out that I’m not exactly what their first impressions lead them to believe I am.

We sold the house - did I mention that? Full price - cash! That means no more sleepless nights (particularly for Jonna) wondering how we’re going to get through the next several months. That’s an incredible load off our minds. We won’t close for another month, but we’ll make it through until then. We have been amazed time and time again by people today. As we were watching the second newscast on CBS - which included a quick flash of the for sale signs on both the house and the car - the phone rang. Jonna answered it and it was a woman wanting to know whether we had sold the house yet! She was about five minutes too late, as Anne, our realtor, was watching the news with us, having come up to let us know we had sold. This woman could have only gotten the number by watching the newscast, since the house hadn’t even made the listings yet. Then, as soon as she hung up, someone called asking whether we had sold the Jeep yet! He had seen it on the newscast and is coming by Wednesday to look at it. Amazing. Then, a couple of hours ago I discovered that we’re getting people visiting our site from Michael Moore’s website. So I checked and sure enough, there’s the article from the UT on Michael Moore’s website, with a link to WTETW. I am beginning to feel like we’ve touched off a little spark here, and I’m hoping we can do whatever is necessary to fan it into a roaring blaze. I guess that’s a pretty disquieting metaphor, given that it’s the fire season here in California and we’ve already had some tragic fires. But I’m sure you know what I mean.

In the middle of all of this we’ve been trying to paper the kitchen ceiling today. Between checking the website, responding to people, answering the phone, selling the house and generally going bonkers, we did manage to get some of it done and I hope I can finish it tomorrow because I have to start painting the house as well. We are both completely drained, physically and emotionally. With the possible exception of our wedding day (maybe I’ll tell that story sometime) never in our lives have we experienced a single day where so much has happened so quickly.

To all of those who have written us or sent contributions - I wish I could think of some way to express our profound gratitude. At times words fail us - this is one of those times. Although we started the website nearly two months ago and have been busy planning and working on this ever since, it feels like it really all begins today. If I have missed responding to you, please forgive me and know that I have read - and will cherish - every single word of support you’ve sent our way. Time for us to get some rest.

October 28: Hooray! We got the ol’ van back today! She is all fixed and ready to go. Well, we haven’t had the chance to fix the heater yet - haven’t had to worry about that much out here in southern California - but we’re going to be needing it soon, so I guess we’ll get that done some time soon. Right now I’m working on some interior painting and papering that I hope to have done tomorrow so I can start painting the house exterior by Monday. Have to have it done before I start the walk - and that’s only a week away now. I’m going to be very, very busy. At the same time the website traffic is continuing to increase and I’m getting lots of emails from people wishing me well. You can’t imagine how much good those do. As we get down to the wire and haven’t yet sold the house or Jeep the financial end of all of this remains a real worry, and has caused Jonna in particular to lose way too much sleep. We know it will all come together at some point, but we have no idea yet when that point will arrive. Then we get some fantastic letters of support and we both remember that we’re doing the right thing for the right reasons and it really helps us be able to push on.

So far I’ve been able to acknowledge every email we’ve received. I worry that, especially through the first few weeks of the walk, I’ll wind up falling a bit behind on that. We’ll be working out our communications sort of on the fly and Jonna, as I believe I’ve mentioned before, is a world-class technophobe. To her, a mechanical pencil is too much of a machine and therefore cannot be trusted. Same goes for a cigarette lighter. So don’t even think about a computer. And the trouble is, among all the other things we have yet to do within the coming week, I’m going to have to teach her how to check emails, update the website and so forth. It will not be an easy task. Pray for me. And send some happy thoughts her way so that maybe she will refrain from chucking the computer out the window when it doesn’t do what she wants it to do. By the way, none of this is either chauvinistic or demeaning - Jonna will readily agree with every word of it. She hates computers. End of discussion. Well, she has made a couple of minor concessions - she likes Ebay and solitaire, but outside of that, the computer is a vicious little beast lurking back in the corner just waiting for the opportunity to frustrate and aggravate her.

When you read this, I will have removed our clergy robes, albs and stoles from the Walking Sale page. I had thought quite a while back about listing them on Ebay, but at that time I could not find a section on Ebay where they would fit. Jonna encouraged me to try again and, sure enough, Ebay now has a category for such items, so we listed them there a few days ago and have had bids now on all but two of the items we listed. That’s great news and will provide a few more bucks to keep us going. But since they’ll be selling on Ebay I’ve removed them from the Walking Sale.

Among the many things I need to remember to do within the next week are things like: changing our email address from our home one to the gmail address, since we’ll be losing the home address when we sell the house; disconnecting our phone landline and notifying everyone who needs to know about that; cancelling the few subscriptions we have and so forth. All the normal things people do when they move - except that we’re not moving to any particular place for now and that tends to complicate things a bit. We got a PO box in Lakeside and will have to get our daughter, Kari, to check that for us on a regular basis. Most of our bills are set up for electronic payment, so as long as I can find a place to get online there shouldn’t be too much problem there. I’m boring you, I think.

One more week - and I’m as ready as I think I’m going to be. I’m ready to walk. I’m ready to meet many of you and talk with you. I’m ready to concentrate on the purpose of this rather than all the mechanics of preparation that have consumed us so much for the past couple of months. I’m ready to let our leadership know that I am more than displeased with what they have done and what they are doing and I do not intend to sit still for anymore of it - and that there are millions of us who have had more than enough of being deceived, manipulated, demeaned and ignored. I’m ready to do what I can to shake us out of our long national nightmare of anger and fear and help people start to think once again about what kind fo future we are creating for our children and grandchildren. I’m ready to stand up in the face of the illusion of security that has been used to strip away our rights, our freedoms and the very essence of what it means to be an American and let those who would use fear to control us know that my country and my grandchildren’s future mean far more to me than any pretense of safety they can conjure up. I’m ready to let the snake oil salespeople know that it’s time for them to pack up and slouch off the stage - and try to find some people who remember what the job description of a public servant is supposed to be. I’m ready.

October 26: We’re getting closer and closer to the walk date - and busier and busier. I’ve become convinced the Jeep is going through pre-separation anxiety. Last week the starter motor quit - the first problem we’ve ever had with it - and we had to replace it. The day before yesterday it began losing bladder control. Occasionally it would wet itself all over our driveway. Poor thing. From the intermittent nature of the leak, I suspected it was the water pump. I was right. We replaced that today. We may be the only people in the world to own a neurotic Jeep. I’ve been trying to reassure it that it’s new owner will treat it just as nicely as we have. Now all it needs is a new owner. And maybe some counseling.

The San Diego NBC affiliate station was out to interview me this morning. I thought the interview went well again. They told me that they would be airing it at 4, 5 and 6 this afternoon, but there was a terrible fire today in Riverside in which four firefighters lost their lives. I’m sure coverage of that disaster quite understandably displaced the story on my walk. Perhaps it will air tomorrow. In the meantime, we’ll be keeping the families of those firefighters in our thoughts and prayers.

I decided today would be my last day on the job - I have LOTS to do in the next week, including painting the entire house! I’ve enjoyed the work, perhaps more than any other job I’ve ever had. And who knows what awaits us on the other end of my walk? Tomorrow I plan on going down to retrieve the van, assuming it’s ready. I’ll know tomorrow morning.

The number of visitors to the website spiked yesterday for some reason, and Jonna and I have been trying to figure out why. Neither of us have been able to come up with a reason yet, but it sure is nice to see the numbers going up. Still having the same problem with the weird petition signing results. I submitted a request for assistance to our host, but haven’t received a reply yet. Please be aware that if you have signed the petition since October 17^th I most likely did not get your email. If this applies to you, please contact me directly at radicalgeezer@gmail.com (an email address I have been told is wonderfully apropos) and I’ll be sure to include you on the list. Since the petition signing is all messed up I’m afraid I don’t have an accurate count of signers at this time. I hope we can straighten out the problem soon. It’s very late so I’ll put the journal to bed for tonight and check in again soon.

October 23: We’ve been recuperating from the swap meet today. I would say it was a disappointment, but we managed to cover all our expenses - including the day we had to miss because of the van’s transmission giving up the ghost on us and the rental of the van this weekend - and still come out about two hundred bucks ahead. Still, it was the slowest Sunday I’ve ever seen at the swap meet. Various theories were floating around the grounds - a street fair in Encinitas, the Chargers game, etc. but whatever the reason, there were probably less than half the people there you would normally see on a Sunday. We arrived with the van loaded to the gills and Kari’s Cherokee not only loaded, but with a bed strapped to the roof. We left with the van loaded, so I guess we sold a Cherokee’s worth of stuff. And I think we must have set some sort of record: We left the swap meet at exactly 4 p.m., drove back to our house in Lakeside, unloaded the van into the driveway, gassed it up and got it to the U-Haul place in El Cajon at precisely 5 p.m. - the minute they close, thus saving us having to pay rent on it for another day. We were beyond exhausted.

I finally managed to get the van down to Tijuana this morning. My friend at work had the day off and so did I, so we met in San Ysidro and he escorted me across the border to the transmission shop. I was relieved to see it was an actual transmission shop and not just a general auto repair place. It gave me more confidence that they’ll know what they’re doing. The van should be ready to go by Thursday - and at one-fifth what it would have cost on this side of the border.

Laura, the photographer for the Union Tribune, tracked us down at the swap meet and took about a gazillion pictures, on top of the two gazillion she took at the house the other day - and I expect that, at most, one of them will wind up in the paper. I’m sure digital photography has changed her job drastically. If she had been working in film, I doubt that she would have taken one tenth as many pictures as she did. The reporter, Mike, called again today to verify a few bits of information. He said that the article will probably appear in the paper either Friday, the day before I start my walk, or the day of the walk.

People keep asking about preparations - whether I’ve equipped myself yet and so forth. Other than what’s evident on the website in terms of planning the route and such, we’ve made a couple of trips to local thrift stores and have outfitted me with about a half dozen pairs of jeans and long-sleeved white shirts - which will be my "uniform" for the walk - and that’s about it. In terms of any other equipment, we won’t be able to do much until we sell either the Jeep or the house. Actually, we’re not planning on too much in the way of equipment anyway: a very light one-man tent, a backpack, a sleeping bag. I plan to travel as light as possible and won’t need even those things for the first few days anyway, as Jonna will be picking me up at the end of my walk for as long as the first week. After that, I’ll be out of practical range and will be needing the tent and such unless I find people along the way who are willing to put me up for the night. Still looking for people between Julian and Yuma who might be willing to put up with me for a night.

When Mike called today he asked me what my plans were when we reached Washington D.C. Was I going to the White House or what? I told him that we have no firm plans for that end yet, that what will happen in Washington will develop as my walk progresses. But I did say that I hoped by the time arrive we would find a contingent of Congress members willing to receive my petition. As for the Opportunist Occupying the Oval Office, I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to meet him - and I doubt he’d be much interested in crossing my path. I try at all times to be civil and respectful to everyone I meet, but I doubt I could maintain a pretense in front of the OOOO, and would probably wind up telling him exactly what I thought of him which, while honest, would probably not be very wise. Jonna would most likely try to whap him upside the head, and outside of providing an immense degree of satisfaction for her, that would undoubtedly be counter-productive.

We’ve been talking a bit about what we’ll do on the other side of the walk. It will depend somewhat on where the country is at by that time, of course, but if our leadership hasn’t yet come to its senses, we’ll certainly continue to pursue our objectives. We’re also watching Barak Obama and John Edwards closely and wondering if either of them would be interested in a couple of dedicated workers. I’d mention Hilary Clinton as well but while we both think she’d make a fine president, I (sadly) believe there’s too much raw, unthinking, emotional baggage among the electorate for her to be successful. Too many people hate her just for the sake of hating her, which is a terrible commentary on our citizenry - but an inescapable reality nonetheless.

Now we have to get rid of much of the stuff we didn’t sell at the swap meets. We’ve taken a load down to the Amvets thrift shop today. The baby clothes will go to a local church that takes them to an orphanage down in Mexico. Some things are just going to be tossed. I don’t want Jonna having to deal with any more stuff than she has to once the house sells - especially since it’s becoming pretty obvious that I’ll be a good distance down the road by the time that happens and won’t be able to help her.

October 20: I’ve always thought that any day you experience something new is a good day. By that measure, today was a very good day. After continuing the process of cleaning up and fixing up around the house today, I had a limousine run this evening taking a couple to a company party way out in the mountains northeast of San Diego. Apparently it’s a yearly event held at a "ranch" that is only a ranch in the San Diego sense of the word - that is to say, the home was actually a series of buildings, each one basically containing a room of the home, built on the side of a desert mountain. Quite the place. My clients invited me to join the dinner - probably because the nearest place to get anything at all to eat was about fifteen miles away. As the home is built on multiple levels of the mountainside, so food service was set up accordingly. The hostess told us we would find taco and burrito fixings on the main level, seafood on the upper level and "exotic meats" on the lower level.

I opted for the seafood first, since I’ve never met an ocean dweller I didn’t like, and politely downed a few huge shrimp, followed by some wonderful miniature cream puffs that I thought only Jonna knew how to make. I bypassed the taco/burrito section. You can’t walk fifty feet anywhere near San Diego without falling over a taco shop. But I had to check out the exotic meats department, wondering just how exotic it was. You can never tell in San Diego. With the amount of money floating around this county it really wouldn’t surprise me much to find some dinner party serving panda, condor and white rhinoceros kabobs.

It wasn’t quite that exotic, but it was exotic. The meats were buffalo, elk and rattlesnake. They also had jerkies - emu, crocodile and kangaroo. I tried the buffalo first. Not bad. Just a tad chewy but good flavor. I had no interest in the elk - I’ve had venison and such and never cared for it, and I figured elk had to be pretty much the same. But I debated the rattlesnake for just a minute - wasn’t too sure I wanted to go there. Finally I figured, why not? Actually, I told the server, "Well, I figure it’s better to bite a rattlesnake than to have one bite you." I have to say I was disappointed. The meat was so thoroughly marinated in a plum and Peruvian pepper sauce that all you could really taste was the marinade. Not that it was bad, but that’s all there was to it.

Next was the emu, crocodile and kangaroo jerky. I tried the emu first and it was quite tasty. Next came the crocodile. Very strange taste and texture. Not bad, just strange. I’d like to say it was kind of like such and such, but I can’t think of anything to compare it to. Sorry. Finally, the kangaroo. Another disappointment. Not much of any flavor at all - just a chewy, nondescript jerky.

There aren’t too many days when you get to try five different foods you’ve never eaten before, so it was a really neat experience. At one point, one of the servers mentioned that the rattlesnake meat cost them fifty bucks a pound. I quickly realized that I’m in the wrong business. A couple of quick trips to the desert and I could relax for a while.

We rented a van today to get our stuff to the swap meet, since ours won’t be fixed for a while yet - still haven’t managed to get it down to Tijuana. The whole van rental experience was a telephone nightmare. When I first came to San Diego I worked for a company that designed call center software. I’m one of those people who absolutely hate to talk to automated phone systems, so it was a real challenge for me to design automated phone systems that wouldn’t drive callers crazy. I was quite proud of some of the systems I designed - one in particular was the system for the Clark county, Nevada jury system. If you’re called to jury duty in Clark County and call about your jury service, on your first call the system will ask you a series of questions pertaining to your qualifications to serve. This information is recorded in the system’s database. After your first call, all you have to do is enter your juror ID number. The system hits the database, retrieves your information, and you never are asked the same question twice. You are also never given options that don’t apply to you or asked for information that is not relevant to your situation.

Anyway, I digress. First of all, we have over half a dozen San Diego area phone books lurking around the house which range in terms of usefulness from semi-useful to emergency toilet paper supply. Second, in a rather extensive sampling of numbers for truck rental companies, approximately one quarter of them are no longer in service, another quarter are answered by a fax machine, a third quarter are answered by a regular answering machine and the final quarter take you to a national call center for the company you called. One exception - I did have one call answered by a real, live local human being. Unfortunately, he spoke only Spanish.

I wound up with the U-Haul national call center, which wanted me to answer a few questions to make the process of renting the appropriate vehicle "easier", the machine told me. Right. The first question was, "How many bedrooms do you want to move?" I don’t want to move any bedrooms. In fact, I know exactly what I want, so just get me to someone I can talk to.

A few little secrets for those of you who hate stupid systems as much as I do. If you don’t reply at all, or reply "Help" or "Operator" or "Agent" a few times (usually the default is three) the machine gives up and connects you to a human being. This doesn’t always work. Sprint, for instance, will just disconnect you if you refuse to play their game. I repeated "Help" three times (feeling kind of like Dorothy chanting, "There’s no place like home" - but I refused to click my heels) and the machine relented and connected me to Madeleine who, I eventually found out, was in Pennsylvania. Madeleine gave me a number which does not appear in the local phone books (I checked) so I called it. I got an answering machine. Back to the national call center. Helphelphelp. I got Madeleine again. She didn’t have another number. I tried a few other companies. I got similar results. I gave up. This was Thursday night.

So this morning I searched my driving memory for nearby rental places I have passed in my wanderings and drove to one that happened to be a U-Haul location. It took me all of five minutes to reserve a van for tomorrow. The moral of this story, I suppose, is that if you encounter an obtuse automated phone call center, your best bet is to abandon the phone altogether and, if possible, accomplish what you want to accomplish in person. If I had the time, I’d write to U-Haul and describe my experience in even greater detail than what I’ve provided here. I did that with Sprint, who ignored my letter as blithely as they did my calls. I no longer deal with Sprint. Technology can be wonderful - I truly believe that. It can also be an excuse to allow your customer service to deteriorate to the point of non-existence. I find more and more companies opting for the second path. And I haven’t even mentioned the companies whose phone agents are calling us quite regularly from India and can neither pronounce our names nor much of anything else that is understandable as English. This is not prejudice - it is cold, consistent experience. I’m not too thrilled about the outsourcing of jobs, but I am totally dumbfounded by those companies who outsource the jobs to agents who are unable to intelligibly speak the requisite language. I also haven’t mentioned the recorded sales pitches for mortgages, siding, windows, etc. that do not even permit you to tell anyone to take you off their calling list. Are these legal?

Enough rant. We got a van rented. The local NBC affiliate will apparently be there the day I begin my walk. I wonder who all is going to be there? We also got word today of a donation arriving through San Diego Veterans for Peace. I don’t know who sent it yet, but Thank You, Thank You, Thank You! The petition signing page on the website is still delivering the weird results I mentioned yesterday. It has me worried. If anyone can provide any wisdom on the subject I would truly appreciate it.

October 19: An item of business today. Every email I’ve received from (I assume) petition signers since October 17 - except one - has been in a similar format and very strange. The website is set up so that when someone signs the petition it generates an email that contains the person’s name and email address. For instance, I’ll get an email that says "John Smith jsmith@aol.com."

However, since the 17th, all but one of them begin with three dots, then a first name, then a four digit number followed by yahoo.com. For instance, it will be ...Chris1476@yahoo.com.

If anyone knows what is causing this I’d really appreciate hearing from you. Has someone hacked the website? Is someone just playing a game? I’d really like to know. I tried using the email address without the preceding dots ( such as Chris1476@yahoo.com) to try to contact the people these are supposedly from, but my attempts come back as undeliverable. My website experience is extremely limited so I hope someone can tell me what’s going on. I've tried test emails which come through just fine, but don't know what else to do. IF YOU HAVE SIGNED THE PETITION IN THE LAST FOUR DAYS, PLEASE EMAIL ME DIRECTLY AT radicalgeezer@gmail.com Maybe we can get this figured out. Thank you for your help.

October 18: There have been a number of times in our lives when we’ve said to each other that if we ever wrote a book about the bizarre events we muddle through, no one would ever believe it. This seems to be one of those times. First the transmission went out in the van. Mind you, the last time we experienced any sort of failure on the van was about three years ago when the fuel pump decided it didn’t want to pump fuel anymore as we were merrily cruising out Interstate 8 taking Jonna’s mother on a little desert fossil hunt. Then the transmission curls up and dies the night before our swap meet. We’ve never had any sort of trouble with the Jeep. Never. Until this morning. The starter motor suddenly elected to join the van’s transmission in that great junkyard in the sky. Just like that. No warning, no clue. So instead of spending the day cleaning up the yard and painting and so forth, I spent it getting the lousy starter motor replaced so we had at least on operable vehicle. I kept telling Jonna she messed up our feng shui when she cleaned up the house. She whapped me. She does that often. She claims I need it. I unerringly disagree.

Well, at least there’s some potential good news on the van. It appears it’s going to cost us a whole bunch less to get it roadworthy down in Tijuana - when we can get it there. I’ve been trying for the past few days to come up with a time when I can go down with my friend from work - to no avail. I might be able to get it down there tomorrow, but the shop that’s going to fix it won’t be able to work on it until Monday, and we already reserved spaces for this coming Sunday at the swap meet again, which means I’ve got to find an alternative way to get the stuff to the swap meet on Sunday morning. Sheesh.

On the national affairs front, it suddenly occurred to me today that we should have taken the advice of the OOOO’s (Opportunist Occupying the Oval Office) father. I recall when he instructed us all to "read my lips" on the subject of taxes. I realized that we might want to go back and carefully examine any existing videos of the OOOO being sworn into office. As I recall, he is supposed to say something about pledging to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. Can someone go back and check? I think he may have become confused, and pledged to subvert, preempt and amend the Constitution of the United States of America. If that’s what he actually pledged, he’s doing a heckuva job, Brownie.

Finally, a quote from Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law professor at George Washington University, on the passing of the Detainee Act by Congress and the signing of that Act by the president - the Act that permits the president to declare anyone an enemy combatant without proof, rights of habeas corpus, right to trial or limit to imprisonment (from "Countdown", October 17):

"Well, this is going to go down in history as one of our greatest self-inflicted wounds. And I think you can feel the judgment of history. It won’t be kind to President Bush.

But frankly, I don’t think that it will be kind to the rest of us. I think that history will ask, Where were you? What did you do when this thing was signed into law? There were people that protested the Japanese concentration camps, there were people that protested these other acts. But we are strangely silent in this national yawn as our rights evaporate."

If there is one single thing I regret about all of this it’s the workload it’s put on Jonna. While I’m still putting in as many hours as I can driving, she’s working like a fiend back here getting everything ready. And when I say everything, I mean everything. Since we made the decision to sell the house she’s been whipping it in shape to show - no mean feat. At the same time she’s riding herd on me, making sure that I’ve always got something to do. Well, actually threatening the continuation of my mortal existence if I slack off at all.

By the way, I know what some of you are probably thinking. "They live in San Diego county and they’re selling their house. They’ll make enough money to hire someone to carry him across the country piggyback if they want." We wish. Actually, that would be an extremely uncomfortable way to travel three thousand miles. We have a double wide mobile home in a senior park. If we’re lucky, we’ll make enough to meet our needs for the duration of the trip, which will leave us pretty much flat when it’s over...flatter than flat if we have to replace the van. That’s why we’re asking for your donations. We’ll do this anyway, but help would sure be nice.

Things began looking a bit better today. Before we can sell the house the park management has to determine whether we need to make improvements so that it meets "park standards". We were pleased to learn that most improvements they want us to make we were already in the process of doing, and that the others are within reason.

The photographer for the San Diego Union Tribune - Laura - came out on Sunday amidst our van woes to take some pictures before I had to go to work. Jonna told me later that after I left, she stayed another couple of hours talking with Jonna - mostly about kids and school and so forth. That happens to us a lot; we meet nice people who feel comfortable talking to us about whatever is on their minds. I hope that will happen a lot on my walk. I have to tie this up for tonight - there’s plenty to do tomorrow, and I expect that I’ll get about half of it done if I’m lucky. Time is growing short.

October 14: It could have happened at a worse time. We keep telling ourselves that. It helps to keep us from throwing things. We stuffed the van to the ceiling this morning and traded the Wrangler for Kari & Joey’s Cherokee and stuffed that full as well so we’d be ready to head down to the swap meet in San Diego early-early tomorrow morning and continue the process of converting much of our stuff to cash. I drove the Cherokee to work for a couple of evening runs while Jonna picked up our granddaughter to take her out looking for fabric Jonna’s going to use to make some things for her bedroom.

Around nine o’clock my cell phone rings. It’s Jonna, who knows not to call when I’m on a run unless it’s important. It’s important. They got the fabric, returned to Kari’s place, and when she went to leave the van would not go into reverse. Forward - fine. No reverse. I dropped off my clients downtown and found another chauffeur (Thanks, Greg!) Who would pick them up later so I could leave to see if I could do anything about the van. So at one in the morning I’m in the kids’ driveway pouring transmission fluid down the van’s gullet, hoping that’s all it will take to get it to behave again. No such luck.

So there we are in the very wee hours of Sunday morning, due at the swap meet at five a.m. to set up, all packed and ready - except that the van resolutely refuses to back up. After an hour or so of weighing all the (non-existent) options...who do we know that has a van or pickup? Nobody...where could we rent one at 2 a.m. on Sunday morning? Hah!...let’s see - if I could get it out of the driveway and take it to the swap meet as long as I don’t have to back up - uh, no...we finally realize we’re washed up. We lose the $50 we paid to reserve spaces at the swap meet (no rain checks, no refunds, etc.) and reschedule for two weeks down the road. Oh well.

Like I said, it could have happened at a worse time. It could have happened a month from now, when I’ll be out in the middle of the Anza-Borrego desert huddled in a one man tent and Jonna will be relying on the van as her only means of transportation, since we’ll have sold the Wrangler by then. That would have been much, much worse. But it also could have waited just one more day. That would have been nice. Looks like a chunk of the proceeds from selling the Wrangler will go in to getting the van road worthy again. We had hoped that selling the Jeep would support us through the first month and a half. I guess it will be more like a month.

New Orleans Voices for Peace has us up on their website now and we’re beginning to get a little traffic from there. We’ve only been to New Orleans once - when Jay and his wife Jennifer graduated from Tulane - but we loved it and have wanted to go back ever since. Sat at the Café du Monde and munched on beignets, walked along with a little impromptu Mardi Gras type parade, browsed for a while in a little art shop where we were mistaken for people who actually had money, and camped out in our tent just outside the city. We can only hope that the city will once again become what it was so that one day we will have more than our memories available to us and will be able to return to a place full of life, full of spirit, full of soul.

October 13: I realize there are certain aspects of this for which I am not fully prepared. I ran up against one of them this evening. Since word is now out at work, I knew it wouldn’t be long until I encountered some friction. When I arrived at work this evening, two of my coworkers were sitting at the table in our break area. One of them heard that I would be leaving my job soon and asked why. Before I had a chance to say anything, the other person pointed at me and said - in a clearly mocking tone - "Because he thinks we’re not at war."

Now, had he simply stated, as a matter of clarification, "Because he thinks we’re not at war," I would have let it pass and continued the conversation he had interrupted. Likewise, had he used the mocking tone and said something like, "Because he says we’re not at war," I would probably have done the same. But the combination of the mockery with the presumption to tell someone else what I think was more than I was prepared to let slide. So I said to him, "No, that’s not true. I understand that we’re not at war and I want to try to help other people understand that."

But he continued to assert his clairvoyance: "No, you think we’re not at war." I was foolish enough to hope that I could clarify the point for him, so I said, "OK, let me ask you this - are we at war with the nation of Iraq?" Instead of answering the question, he launched into a diatribe about being at war with terrorists and making the country safe and freeing the Iraqi people. I replied, "I didn’t ask you about any of that - I asked you a very straightforward question - are we at war with the nation of Iraq?" To shorten the story a bit, I wound up asking him the question over half a dozen times and each time getting in reply not an answer, but a regurgitation of right wing talking points I’ve heard so many times before. At one point I was a tiny bit surprised when I asked the question and he tried to dismiss it by saying, "That’s a rhetorical question." I replied, "No, it is not rhetorical. It is a very direct question that you should be able to answer with a clear yes or no." I really shouldn’t have been surprised at all, as I learned quite some time ago that many people who have no idea what the word "rhetorical" means use it to try to duck or dismiss a question they’re afraid to answer. At any rate, after trying more times than I should have to begin outlining the rationale behind what I’m doing and getting in return a deluge of desperate justifications that included nearly everything short of waving a flag in my face and pulling a picture of the president out of his wallet, I finally gave up, saying, "We have nothing to talk about." He tried a couple more verbal fusillades, but I simply repeated, "We have nothing to talk about," until he finally subsided.

It really upset me and made me quite angry - and I’m going to have to learn very quickly not to let either of those things happen, because I know I’m going to be encountering quite a bit of this. And I’m going to have to learn to recognize much more quickly when I’m trying to develop a reasonable conversation with someone who is doing the equivalent of the grade school practice of covering their ears and shouting, "I can’t hear you! Nyah Nyah Nyah!"

But it is distressing. And it isn’t the first venue where I’ve encountered it. When I was in the ministry, I often came up against people who would become extremely upset when what I was preaching wasn’t exactly the same thing their grandmothers had taught them or kindly old Reverend Smith had preached. In the church, the attitude was often encapsulated in (yet another) slogan: "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it" - a cute-ish way of advertising to the world that one’s mind is firmly closed and securely locked. It is sad to realize that there is a great number of people in this world who - at some point and for some strange reason - make the voluntary and conscious decision to literally stop thinking. I suppose for some it provides a sense of security to pretend that you now know all the answers, that the world has been neatly sorted into either black or white, and that anyone who even politely suggests that there just may be some shades of gray out there must immediately be dismissed or even demonized.

I don’t have all the answers and I will never pretend that I do. I have no perfect solution for the situation we have created in Iraq and around the world. But I do know - and I sincerely believe that the evidence makes it quite clear - that what we are presently doing has no possible outcome other than unending death and destruction and the evaporation of the very essence of what it means to be an American. I am not willing to sit back and allow that to happen without trying to do something about it.

By the way, if you’ve been wondering whether we’re really serious about this and whether we’re truly committed to making this walk, I just want to let you know that we put the house up for sale today.

October 12: Stepping out on faith. Our daughter Becky has likened what we’re doing to the exercise she (and so many others) did at her youth group in her teens. One of them would stand on a chair, close their eyes, stiffen their body, and fall backwards off the chair. The rest of the group would catch the member as they fell from the chair, but it was an act of faith. With eyes closed, there was no personal guarantee that there would be anyone there to catch them. She says that’s pretty much what we’re doing - except that we’re doing it with our entire lives. I suppose she’s right. Not that it’s the first time either of us has stepped out completely on faith - but I expect it is the most drastic thing we’ve ever done.

I should mention that in my 57 years of experience I have many times trusted in others to do the right things - and I have many times been burned, sometimes quite severely. But long ago I made a conscious decision about this. I took a look at who I am and who I would like to become. I decided that I am basically a trusting person. I firmly believe that, in general, people will live up to...or down to...your expectations of them. I also decided that I would like to continue to be a trusting person. So I determined that in those numerous cases in my life where I have trusted someone and been wounded in that trust, the problem was not within me, but rather within the person who could not live up to my expectations of how people ought to rightly relate to each other in the world. Were I to change who I am as a result of the actions of another, that would mean I am permitting someone else to define who I am. Letting others define you, I think, is never a good idea. It is not wise. It is not responsible. The only one who, ultimately, should define who I am is me. Therefore, my decision those many years ago was to continue to trust people to do the right thing regardless of how many times I wind up being disappointed. I know I will often be disappointed in the future, but in sum I believe it is worth the risk. Those times when my trust is betrayed, I hope that those who fail me will learn something from the experience and grow, because I believe the weight on most people of betraying an open trust is a heavy burden - a burden they may one day find the wisdom to avoid. And those times when my trust is rewarded I believe that both the people I trusted and myself experience growth in our humanity, our hope, and our experience of the joys of this world. By the way, my faith and trust is reserved for individuals. It does not - nor has it ever - extended to institutions. There is an old saying that you can calculate the intelligence of a mob by taking the average intelligence of the members of the mob and dividing it by the number of people in the mob. I think something quite similar applies to institutions. And while institutions are organisms, they are not human - and will only possess those qualities of humanity that are intentionally and determinedly instilled in them by the members of the institution.

Many people have a hard time believing we’re doing what we’re doing. "You’re going to walk the whole way?" Yes. "You’re going to quit your job and have no income?" Yes. "You’re selling all your stuff?" As much as we can before we begin. "Where will you stay?" Wherever we are welcomed. "What if you’re not welcomed?" I’ll have a tent. "What will you do when you’ve finished the walk?" We’ll look around and see where life takes us next. "You’re not serious!?" Yes. Very. "What will you do if the changes you seek all come to pass before you make it to Washington?" I will celebrate. "Won’t you feel that your time has been wasted?" Not at all. I will have done what I knew I must do, and I will hope that my determination to do this will have played some small part in the changes that must be made.

There is change in the air. Do you feel it? People are just beginning to really think about what’s going on. Perhaps some of the things I want to accomplish will actually come to pass before I can get to Washington. I can certainly hope so. But I can’t decide this will probably happen and call off my walk. Those who wish to keep us confused and controlled have become too practiced at their craft. And government moves too slowly to accomplish the sort of changes I’m petitioning for rapidly...unless it is pushed. Let’s push. Hard. Relentlessly. Together.

October 11: I think today will wind up being the day it all broke loose. Jonna and I were busy cleaning up the yard this afternoon when I got a call from Juliette Vara, a reporter from Channel 10 news in San Diego. She wanted to do an interview. About a half hour later I was walking with her and her cameraman around Lindo Lake Park - with Finn and Spoof along, of course. Jonna elected to stay away from the camera, feeling that thirty minutes was not sufficient time to go from garden grungy to camera ready.

I knew this facet would be coming, but I was not prepared for it. The interview went well, I thought, and Ms. Vara treated what I had to say respectfully. She asked me quite a bit about preparations and so forth - I think she had a hard time taking in how much we’re doing this on faith that resources will come and people will be supportive. As we walked around the lake, she observed that I was giving up a lot to do this. And that’s when I lost it. I tried to say that I wasn’t giving up anything compared to nearly 6,000 parents who have lost 2,700 sons and daughters - and as many as half a million or more Iraqi civilians who have lost their lives so far, but I choked up and couldn’t quite get the words out for a while. I don’t intend to get emotional about this, but it is not something over which I seem to have much control. I waited nervously tonight to see what they would do with this and was quite relieved just a few minutes ago to see the report they did. It came out well.

And now I expect the floodgates will begin to open. In the report they told about how I was quitting my job to do this - something I haven’t mentioned at work yet. I was planning to let them know in about a week that I would be taking an extended leave of absence, but I’m afraid it is quite possible when word of this gets out at work I will find myself without employment a few weeks before I hoped. Not much I can do about it. We’ll simply have to find other ways to keep things going a little earlier than we had anticipated.

Beyond the interview, it was an evening of real serendipity. We had been given tickets to a spaghetti dinner tonight hosted by Street Light - a local organization committed to issues of homelessness, poverty and social issues. Early this afternoon I received an email from Ana Barral, who reports for the Street Light newspaper and had happened upon our website and wanted to see if I would do an interview with her. She was surprised when I called her right away and told her that we’d be at the dinner and if she was there I’d be happy to talk with her. Turned out she was helping to serve at the dinner, so afterwards we sat down and talked for a while.

Ana wanted to introduce me to some of her friends. I spent some time talking with her friend Sue, who told me that just this morning she had been thinking that someone ought to be walking across the country to protest what is going on - and within a few hours she, too, had discovered my website. It does us so much good when we encounter people like those we met this evening. We don’t know where life will take us once my walk is over, but we now know that, if we do return to San Diego, we have found a community where we can relate to the people around us and be amidst true friends.

I don’t know who emailed Channel 10 to tell them about my walk, but Thank You to whoever did. Like I said, I wasn’t prepared for this phase to kick in, but I also know that I wouldn’t have been any more prepared regardless of when it happened. It will be interesting to see if this interview will begin to open up channels to further opportunities to let people know what we’re doing. I suppose the next few days will tell. For now, both Jonna and I are completely emotionally drained and I’m going to try to get some sleep. Peace.

October 10: Well, turns out the vacuum problem is more than a Sheltie hairball after all. It doesn’t seem to be picking up anything at all. Guess we’ll have to see about borrowing Kari’s vacuum for a while. We have had lousy luck with vacuums over the years. Maybe it will be something simple and easy to fix. Hah.

I took the day off today - first, because I’ve been routinely working 14 or more hours a day and needed a break, and second, because the reporter from the San Diego Union Tribune came to the house today to interview me. He was very nice and I think the interview went well. He said that he’s going to wait until nearer our departure date to do a story (no surprise there) and also plans to do regular updates as my walk progresses.

Since I had the day off, we planned to get a number of things accomplished, few of which actually got done - as is usually the case. I did get a number of pictures taken and added several new things to the Walking Sale, so check it out. As is so often the case in my line of work, when I take a day off I wind up with a second day off (I think they forget about you when you’re not there for a day), so at the moment I have tomorrow off as well and we’ll see how many of the things we planned to do today we can get done tomorrow. We’ll be at Kobey’s swap meet in San Diego again this coming Sunday trying to convert more of our stuff to cash, and we’re trying to assemble what we want to take this time. We rented a double space this time to accommodate more stuff, since this is probably the last time we’ll have the opportunity to do a swap meet before my walk begins. It’s getting close now. I’ve been trying to figure out what clothing I’ll need for the walk. Even in southern California the nights get pretty cool in November, and after the first six or seven days I’ll be on my own out in the middle of the Anza-Borrego desert, so I’ll need some warm stuff, but I want to keep it as light weight as possible. It will probably be another week or so before I seriously get down to equipping, but it’s one more list to make.

October 9: The vacuum was suffering from a two Sheltie-sized hairball, which can be quite impressive. The one down side of having two Shelties is that at certain times of the year you find yourself ankle deep in fur, even though to look at them you’d swear that they hadn’t lost a single hair. I begin to suspect that they import it from unemployed neighborhood dogs in exchange for squeaky toys and a few smuggled morsels of kibble and decorate the place with it in the wee hours of the night when we’re fast asleep.

I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the global problem of terrorism lately. As I say on my home page, I don’t pretend to have all the answers, but I have recently come to the conclusion that, in terms of trying to quell the use of terrorist tactics in the world, it is difficult to imagine that this nation could have done anything worse over the past five years than what it has done. By portraying our actions as a war, we have perversely legitimized those who resort to terrorism. Instead of treating terrorists as the criminals and mass murderers they are, we label them enemy combatants and thus lend them a sovereignty and status they do not otherwise possess or deserve. What we should have done from the beginning is to sit down on an international scale and set about to determine effective methods of first addressing the root causes of terrorism, and second, to establish consistent, international, cooperative ways to identify, apprehend and prosecute those who engage in terrorist activities.

But not us. Not the U S of A. For the past five years, you would think that we were the only nation ever to suffer from terrorist attacks. For the past five years, you would think that all terrorists are radical Islamic fundamentalists. For the past five years, you would think that anyone, anywhere in the world who would resort to terrorism dreams day and night of finding some opportunity to cause massive death and destruction somewhere on American soil. We have all but forgotten that many nations have suffered - and continue to suffer - far greater devastation from terrorist attacks than we have.

Few of us have even heard of the Tamil Tigers. Are you ready for a few eye-openers? The Tamil Tigers, a militant Sri Lankan force, are responsible for more suicide terrorist attacks than all other terrorist groups in the world combined. Did you get that? All other groups combined. And guess what? They’re not Muslims. They’re not even a religious group. They are a secular Marxist force that draws membership primarily from Hindu families in the Tamil province of Sri Lanka. Yet when we speak of terrorism, groups such as the Tamil Tigers never even enter our conversation - because they haven’t attacked us. But if we are truly concerned with defeating the idea of terrorism, it should be easy to understand that we have no hope of even making a dent in the problem unless we examine the how and why of terrorism on a global basis.

I’ve been following some interviews with Associate professor Robert Pape from the University of Chicago, who has done extensive research and recently released a book titled, "Dying to Win: The Logic of Suicide Terrorism". This gentleman has been doing the sort of research that our government should be doing - but the current administration has indicated no interest whatsoever in his work (he says, however, that the defense department in acutely interested in his findings). He has studied over 400 instances of suicide terrorism that occurred between 1980 and 2004. A few of his findings, which should be useful to establishing some important clues as to how to proceed in the face of terrorism:

"The central fact is that overwhelmingly suicide-terrorist attacks are not driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland."

"Since suicide terrorism is mainly a response to foreign occupation and not Islamic fundamentalism, the use of heavy military force to transform Muslim societies over there, if you would, is only likely to increase the number of suicide terrorists coming at us...The operation in Iraq has stimulated suicide terrorism and has given suicide terrorism a new lease on life."

"The evidence shows that the presence of American troops is clearly the pivotal factor driving suicide terrorism."

"Before our invasion, Iraq never had a suicide-terrorist attack in its history. Never. Since our invasion, suicide terrorism has been escalating rapidly with 20 attacks in 2003, 48 in 2004, and over 50 in just the first five months of 2005. Every year that the United States has stationed 150,000 combat troops in Iraq, suicide terrorism has doubled...There is no evidence there were any suicide-terrorist organizations lying in wait in Iraq before our invasion. What is happening is that the suicide terrorists have been produced by the invasion."

"Many people worry that once a large number of suicide terrorists have acted that it is impossible to wind it down. The history of the last 20 years, however, shows the opposite. Once the occupying forces withdraw from the homeland territory of the terrorists, they often stop - and often on a dime...That doesn’t mean that the existing suicide terrorists will not want to keep going...but the real issue is not...Osama bin Laden...It is whether anybody listens to him. That is what needs to come to an end for Americans to be safe from suicide terrorism."

"I think [the chances are of a weapon of mass destruction being used in an American city] depends not exclusively, but heavily, on how long our combat forces remain in the Persian Gulf. The central motive for anti-American terrorism, suicide terrorism, and catastrophic terrorism is response to foreign occupation, the presence of our troops. The longer our forces stay on the ground in the Arabian Peninsula, the greater the risk of the next 9/11, whether that is a suicide attack, a nuclear attack, or a biological attack."

Food for thought. By the way, I’ve also been wondering lately if Keith Olbermann might wind up becoming the Walter Cronkite of this generation. I can only hope he will continue to be given the opportunity to be heard.

October 8: I’ve been working long hours at the job lately, which hasn’t permitted much time for the journal when combined with the many other preparations under way. I did find time to do a bit of redesigning of the website - the separate "Support" and "Contact" pages didn’t seem logical, so I combined them into one page and modified some essential information - the primary thing being that San Diego Veterans for Peace is now receiving donations for us, which first of all makes contributions tax deductible (since we haven’t had time to set up a non-profit ourselves yet and probably won’t have the time before the walk begins) and will also make it easier to administer this facet while I’m on the road. Thank you, Dave Patterson and all the great folks at SD VFP!

Becky is still working on a general website redesign. Work there has been slowed down by the death of her husband Joey’s grandfather and the necessary focus that has engendered. I think it won’t be too much longer before the redesign is ready, though, and I’m looking forward to it.

I need to start making a few things clear for those who are interested in walking with me. I’m sure I’ll do this again before the 4^th, but I want people to be as aware as possible of what to expect. It should be clear by now that we are doing this on less than a shoestring. I’m leaving on the 4^th regardless of what may transpire between now and then, but especially at first it’s going to be a day-to-day thing. From the beginning I’ve made it clear that anyone and everyone is welcome to walk with me for a mile, an hour, a day, a week - whatever anyone feels led to do. But I need to make sure that everyone knows that they will be individually responsible for their circumstances. If you want to walk with me for a day, you’ll have to find a way to get yourself from wherever your walk ends to wherever you’re going from there. Longer than a day, you’ll have to accommodate yourself for sleeping arrangements, food, etc. I do hope that as the walk progresses we will be able to form a network of support around us that will assist us with such things as we travel, but there is nothing in place at all yet, so while we may be together for the walk, everyone is on their own beyond that.

And while I’m on that subject, I want to try to begin putting the first section of support together. The first place I am probably going to need accommodations is after Julian - from Ocotillo Wells to Brawley to Glamis to Ogilby to Yuma. If you or people you know live along this route and have a place I could stay for a night sometime during the first half of November I’d really appreciate hearing from you. Also, it would be a good time to let me know - if you live anywhere from Ramona to Yuma - if you have a group you’d like me to meet with during this time period. Talking with others about what I’m doing and why is a very important part of my walk, so if you have an interested group just let me know.

I’m going to have to cut it short for tonight - it’s getting late and the vacuum apparently needs some attention. I’ll be back soon.

October 4: We’re down to one month until I begin my walk and many things are falling into place. There’s much, much, much more to do, but we are making progress. The website continues to pick up traffic, and we’re getting more and more organizations devoting major chunks of their own websites to us. First there was Jackie Wagner at protestispatriotism.com who has been a true believer and a tremendous help. Then U.S. Labor Against the War featured my walk, and San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice, and Progressive Democrats of America. I heard from New Orleans Voices for Peace the other day, who also want to give us space on their site. I’ve been told that the folks at Declaration of Peace are thinking of adopting my walk as part of their ongoing efforts, but I haven’t heard anything official yet. I finally got in touch with the San Diego Union Tribune reporter and will be doing my very first interview with him on Tuesday. Jonna represented us last night at the local Veterans for Peace meeting. She laments that we hadn’t met these people several years ago, as they are truly kindred spirits. Veterans for Peace is going to be helping us through the hoops of managing donations and contributions.

Speaking of which...I am fortunate to be blessed with a reasonable amount of talent in many different areas, but salesmanship is not one of them. I would make a lousy salesperson and I know it. But it is time for me to do a sales pitch. Bear with me. As you’ll know if you’ve been reading this journal, Jonna and I have been doing everything we can think of to try to raise the necessary funding for this endeavor. We’ve started with selling off many of our possessions at local swap meets. We established the Walking Sale page on the website and will be adding more items there shortly. Next week our Jeep Wrangler goes up for sale (I shed large tears as I mention that, because I’ve grown quite attached to the Jeep but it will fund us for a month and a half or so). We have a post office box ready to receive donations, a PayPal account where donations can be made instantly, and we’ll be doing yet another swap meet Sunday after next. The net result after one month? Outside of what we’ve managed to sell at the swap meets, we have had exactly two donations and one sale from the Walking Sale. I believe the financial support is going to come, but in all honesty, this is beginning to panic Jonna. If you believe in what we’re trying to do and in the dialogue and action we’re trying to encourage, even a token contribution at this point would do more to hearten and empower us than you could possibly imagine. I think you can understand that it is more than a bit frightening to be stepping away from every source of income for many months based solely on the conviction that what you’re doing is the right thing to do. Like I said, I firmly believe (and so does Jonna, for that matter) that the financial support will come as the walk progresses, but quite frankly it would do wonders for both of us if we could see some evidence of that early on. I know we’re going to be meeting thousands of people during the course of this walk. If we could get even a few hundred to support us to the tune of a penny per mile it will make this doable. But right now, if we can find even a few who are willing to step out early it will allow us to sleep much better as we confront the chaos of trying to organize this whole thing. I hope you’ll consider becoming one of our early backers. End of sales pitch. See, I told you I was a lousy salesman.

I tried to look into communications for the walk today. I’ll be needing to email text and pictures regularly to Becky, who will post them on the Journal page. I also need to be able to make and receive phone calls all the way across the country. Both of our daughters have Cingular service, so I thought I’d check into that, since the calls to them wouldn’t use minutes for any of us. I discovered that the people working in the cell phone stores do not speak - nor do they understand - English. Before I was able to sit down, the girl who accosted me had me into a $300+ phone, an $80 a month service plan and a $45 per month add-on for internet access. I managed to escape with two brochures written in Sanskrit and my wallet intact.

I am far from a technophobe - in fact, I ran my own computer store for ten years. But the cell phone industry seems to be where the computer industry was in the 80s - nobody involved in it is capable of explaining in readily understandable terms exactly what various things actually do or why you might want or need them. If you don’t already know what they are talking about, they are incapable of communicating with you. And everyone seems interested only in selling you the most expensive equipment and plans they possibly can. That’s the way computers were in the 80s - and one of the reasons I started my own store. I remember one friend who was in the waste management business at that time and thought a computer might be useful in his accounting operations. He had been to a number of stores looking at hardware and software before he came to see me, and by that time was completely overwhelmed by both the cost and the complexity he had been encountering. I talked with him for a while about what he actually wanted to do in terms of computerizing his business and discovered that all he really wanted was a way to track payments and print monthly billings. When I told him what he actually needed, it took two months before he finally decided to trust me, because I told him I could get him up and running with everything he wanted to do for roughly one tenth the cost anyone else had tossed at him. And I did. And he used that system for years, until he sold his business. And the next owner of the business also used it for years. Maybe one of these days someone will cut through all the cell phone garbage and start providing people with the communications they actually want.

At any rate, I gave up. Emailed my son, Jay, and asked him if he could sort through some of this, as he’s kept up on it far more than I have. We’ll be talking on Saturday. Maybe we can get something accomplished. I have more goofy stories about the cell phone industry - maybe I’ll tell them one of these days.

October 3: Not going to say much about the Foley thing washing over the news this week - except that I do wish that one of these days people would stop straining so hard to make the nonexistent connection between pedophilia and homosexuality. The news media could do a lot to correct that bias if they’d only try - even half-heartedly.

I thought I’d reach back just a bit this evening and post a little talk I gave a few months ago at Chalice Unitarian Universalist Church in Escondido - which is under the wise and loving leadership of our dear friend Margo McKenna. She invited me to give a talk on opposition to the Iraq war, while our very close friend Tom Brower offered a talk in support of the war. Yes, Tom remains one of my dearest friends and I forgive him for his stance on the war...but just barely. Despite where he is on the war, he plans on joining me for the first day of my walk. I’ve promised not to point him out to the others who plan to show up - I want him to remain in one piece in the hope that some day he may see the light. Anyway, here’s the talk I gave early this summer:

One of my favorite little word pictures was written by Damon Runyon and included in the movie Guys and Dolls. In the movie, Sky Masterson, played by Marlon Brando, tells this story to explain why he is not about to fall for a sucker bet offered by Nathan Detroit, played by Frank Sinatra. He says, "One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand-new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you're going to wind up with an ear full of cider."

I have a convergent personal philosophy developed over years of observation and direct experience of the world, and that is this: Perhaps the two most suspicious words in the English language are "Trust me." With one particular exception, anytime anyone in this world looks you in the eye and says, "Trust me", your safest response is to hold onto your wallet very tightly and view any and all subsequent statements or actions of that person with the utmost suspicion.

The one exception is for children. Kids, when your parents say to you,"Trust me", you really should trust them. They only tell you this because they honestly have your best interests at heart and sincerely believe that if they were to try to explain to you why you should trust them you probably wouldn’t be able to understand.

But once we have grown beyond childhood, people who resort to imploring us to trust them are almost invariably doing so because they are well aware that they have not offered us - and quite probably are not capable of offering us - any rational, logical, demonstrable reason why we should do so. To boil it down to its essence, people generally resort to "Trust me" because they are acutely aware that they have given you no reason to trust them and that unless they can play on your sympathy or gullibility, you will do the wise and reasonable thing - and not trust them.

I’m saying all of this because it is central to the reason why, from the very beginning, I was vocally and forcefully opposed to the war in Iraq. As I listened to all the rhetoric pouring from every member of the administration - from the president and vice president to Condeleeza Rice to Donald Rumsfeld to Colin Powell - what I realized I was actually hearing, over and over and over again, was "Trust me". Naturally - and it really should be natural, you know - this caused me to take literally everything I was being told with a very, very large grain of salt.

Four years later, I feel that my life-acquired instincts have been thoroughly and glaringly vindicated. But we are here to debate the pro and con of the war in Iraq, and even though it is tempting, I cannot and will not resort to the tactic I’ve just exposed. I cannot say to you, "the war in Iraq was an incredibly foolish and terrible idea - trust me."

While I could offer you a tremendous number of reasons to support my position, time restraints preclude that sort of depth. So I will rely primarily on one concept I’m sure most of you are already at least passingly familiar with, and that is a little treatise known as the just war theory.

Now from the very beginning we could get into all sorts of ways of parsing this, because there are many different interpretations of the just war theory. The theory itself has evolved and expanded somewhat over the years - there are even ongoing efforts to expand it further specifically to attempt to shed a different light on the very war under discussion. But I believe that for most people to whom the just war theory is meaningful, there is general agreement on seven statements that form the foundation of the theory. In order for a war to be considered to be a just undertaking, it must meet these seven criteria. So I want to simply state these criteria and examine the war in Iraq in the light of each.

The first tenet in just war theory is that "A just war can only be waged as a last resort. All non-violent options must be exhausted before the use of force can be justified." While I’m certain that my friend Tom has all sorts of ways to dress this up, the old saying tells us that if it looks like a duck and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck... It seems quite clear that in the run-up to the war in Iraq, we not only did not exhaust all non-violent options, but we quite deliberately circumvented or silenced a number of those options. We can look back and try to assuage this fact by citing the national rage that was blinding us after the murders of September 11^th, 2001, but even the blindness of our rage cannot excuse our allowing it to be manipulated and turned toward an unrelated target. We did not exhaust all non-violent options, and thus the war fails the first criterion for a just war.

Secondly, a just war "is just only if it is waged by a legitimate authority. Even just causes cannot be served by actions taken by individuals or groups who do not constitute an authority sanctioned by whatever the society and outsiders to the society deem legitimate." If we take seriously the mandate for an authority to be seen as legitimate by people both inside and outside of the society, the only current authority that could hope to lay claim to legitimacy would be the United Nations. But let’s forget about that part for just a second and talk about legitimate authority strictly from our own national perspective. I’m sure most of you know that the constitutional authority to declare war is the province of the legislative branch of our government. In the case of this war, based on the information it was given, our legislative branch elected to cede that authority to the executive branch. And we went to war. But we now know that a great deal of the information on which this decision was based was massaged, manipulated, and in some cases just plain wrong. I think it only reasonable to conclude that any authority granted on the basis of information that is not legitimate cannot claim itself to be legitimate. With that understanding, this war also fails this criterion.

The third tenet holds that "A just war can only be fought to redress a wrong suffered. For example, self-defense against an armed attack is always considered to be a just cause. Further, a just war can only be fought with "right" intentions: the only permissible objective of a just war is to redress the injury." For me, this is the most crucial element of the just war theory and the one on which this war fails most emphatically. Indeed, this is the very criterion of the just war theory that a number of people over the past four years have been feverishly attempting to modify, amend, or rewrite - because it leaves absolutely no room for a concept such as a preemptive strike. Moreover, I am convinced that the concept of a preemptive strike is not only completely contrary to any serious definition of a just war theory, but it is absolutely antithetical to the very soul and fabric of this nation. Some of the very earliest flags of this country displayed a snake, with the emblazoned legend, "Don’t Tread On Me." This, I had always presumed, was at the heart of our military might and will. As a country, we hold certain and lethal venom, but we only strike with it in response. If we are wronged, we justly and rightfully redress that wrong. To this day, I remain thoroughly heartsick that we ever even considered - let alone actually employed - such a morally and ethically bankrupt device as a preemptive strike. It is a device that is contrary to nearly every religion or set of moral ethics devised by humankind, and is something I never believed would become a part of the history of the country I have served and loved.

The fourth requirement for a just war is "A war can only be just if it is fought with a reasonable chance of success. Deaths and injury incurred in a hopeless cause are not morally justifiable." I could go on about this one at great length, but will only mention two points. First, it has become fairly evident that there was either no planning whatsoever beyond the initial conquest phase of this war, or the assumptions made by those in positions of power about the direct aftermath were so arrogant, so ignorant of cultural considerations and so superficial as to be essentially meaningless. In other words, our definition of success as we entered into this war was so narrow and cavalier as to preclude its having any real meaning. Secondly, as we have tried so desperately in the years since to fold this adventure into the broader "war on terror", we have effectively made ourselves forever incapable of achieving success. I say this because one of the central points I want to make today - and one that I think it is absolutely crucial that every citizen must soon come to understand - is that we cannot declare a war against a concept, no matter what that concept is, and ever hope to succeed. Declaring a war on terror is perhaps one of the most unfortunate ideas ever to come over this or any nation. We might as well have declared a war on gravity. A war on terror is no more winnable than would be a war on freedom or a war on democracy. The results are foreseeable and inevitable. For every freedom fighter that is killed, two more will rise up to take his or her place. And for every terrorist that is killed, sadly, precisely the same thing will happen. Until we are able to divest ourselves of the notion that such a war can ever have any sort of successful resolution, we will never be able to come together - as a world community - and seriously envision what we can do to wither the various sources that give rise to the will to use terror as a weapon in our global society.

Fifth, "The ultimate goal of a just war is to re-establish peace. More specifically, the peace established after the war must be preferable to the peace that would have prevailed if the war had not been fought." This is a precept that unfortunately requires a bit of prescience to establish, but it touches on a rising fear that I am compelled to mention. I fear that, at least in the hearts and minds of some of the people involved in this war, the ultimate goal may be exactly the opposite of what the just war theory holds to be true here. Recognizing the reality that business quite literally has no conscience unless those in control of that business are wise enough to invest it with one, I truly fear that there are those who would welcome a literally endless state of war. It is, after all, very good for business. From just after World War II until the mid 80s, our nation’s economy was largely based on war - primarily the Cold War. When we spent the Soviet Union into bankruptcy and dissolution, the war basis of our economy disappeared. While a boom in technology began a recovery, many military related industries saw little benefit from that. At the beginning of this century, Halliburton’s stock price languished at about $12 per share. Today it is $80 per share. ExxonMobil began this century at $32 a share with oil at $25 a barrel. Today the stock is $64 a share and oil is, well, as the MasterCard commercial says - priceless. It is entirely possible, as long as we hold to conducting a war on terror, that we have once again instituted a permanent state of war. This point came out a few weeks ago when Tom and Margot and I were discussing such recent revelations as the NSA wiretapping. Tom asked the very reasonable question of whether, during a time of war, it is incumbent upon citizens, for a time, to relinquish certain of their rights and freedoms. I acknowledged that this is certainly the case, but went on to point out that if the war has no end, then any rights and freedoms relinquished will never be regained. It is a point we must all begin to carefully consider.

The sixth tenet of the just war theory is that "The violence used in the war must be proportional to the injury suffered. States are prohibited from using force not necessary to attain the limited objective of addressing the injury suffered." Since this was a preemptive undertaking and did not meet the initial criteria of redressing an injury in the first place, it automatically fails this test.

The last part of the just war theory states, "The weapons used in war must discriminate between combatants and non-combatants. Civilians are never permissible targets of war, and every effort must be taken to avoid killing civilians. The deaths of civilians are justified only if they are unavoidable victims of a deliberate attack on a military target." While I suspect - and hope - that in the initial phases of this war there was at least an attempt to honor this criterion on the part of our military forces, the war has now degenerated into a conflict where those we fight cannot be considered to be an organized military operation. If it is impossible to tell combatants from non-combatants, it becomes impossible to adhere to this tenet.

The result of holding this war up to an examination to determine if it can be considered a just war is then that it clearly fails under two of the criteria; it cannot even be evaluated under another two because of its very nature, we cannot honestly determine whether it meets another two because the real objectives of this war have never been made clear to us, and whether or not it meets one criterion depends wholly on one’s interpretation of what constitutes a legitimate authority.

Those who would support this war cannot hope to do so under the banner of any reasonable evaluation of a just war theory. Without that, any argument for the war can only have at its foundation the premise that the ends will justify the means. And here we come full circle, because in order to believe that the ends will justify the means, we must believe that the ends we seek are so honorable, so pure, so right that they make whatever we do in their pursuit morally and ethically acceptable. While this is a terrible presumption on its face, it is made even more frightening in light of that fact that, while you and I may devoutly hope and expect that the ultimate goal of this war is to democratize and stabilize the middle east, while you and I may sincerely believe that democracy is the best form of government for us and thus, obviously, the best form of government for all nations and peoples, it has never been made clear to us what the ultimate objectives of those who have orchestrated this war truly are. And every single time we have encountered something that gives us pause, something that makes us wonder whether the intentions of our leadership are as honorable and righteous as we should demand that they be - from the detention of prisoners without charges, counsel, trial or any form of due process to torture of detainees to manipulation of intelligence to wiretapping without oversight and more - the explanation we have received from those in authority has amounted to two simple words: "Trust me." I should also point out that if we have stooped to believing that the end justifies the means to justify this war, then we have adopted precisely the same ethical standards as the enemy we currently fight in Iraq, for the insurgents we are fighting truly and deeply believe that their cause is honorable, pure and right. Not only that, but they also believe their cause is holy. As surely as we see them as terrorists, they see us in exactly the same light.

We seem to learn nothing from history. Through the 1800s and well into the 20^th century, in our missionary zeal, we brought a set of moral disciplines to Africa, Central and South America and the South Seas that we truly believed to be God ordained, but that resulted in overpopulation, disease and famine. We taught agricultural methods which we firmly believed were superior and which wound up literally destroying vast sections of entire continents that may never recover. The last time our hubris wreaked havoc on our planet we did it in the name of Christ. This time we’re doing it in the name of democracy.

And that, brothers and sisters, is why I oppose this war. When those in positions of power can offer me nothing more than a plea for my trust based on nothing more than my blind faith as to their honest nature and righteous intentions, I cannot - as a reasonable and responsible citizen - grant them that trust. History, personal experience and common sense all combine to bring me to this conclusion - not to mention the fact that I have a very strong suspicion that you and I are sitting here right now with an ear full of cider.

October 2: We hit a milestone this morning - our 100^th online Signer!!! Hooray! - and thanks so much to each one of you for your willingness to jump on board so early in this project. I can’t tell you how much it means to me and how it encourages me each time I check the emails and see new people have signed the petition. One month to the walk and we have over a hundred signers - is it too much for me to hope that by the time I begin walking we’ll have a thousand? Maybe so, but that’s what I’m going to hope for. By the way, a couple of curious observations: (1) So far, women outnumber men in signing the petition by a margin of almost 2 to 1. I wonder why that is? (2) According to the website statistics page - which, as I’ve noted, isn’t really reliable but can still provide at least approximate information - there have been far more people add the website to their "favorites" list than there have been signers. This also strikes me as odd. I know there are some people waiting to sign in person, but still...

It was a VERY busy weekend - Jonna and I set up at Kobey’s Swap Meet in San Diego both Saturday and Sunday, while I also worked during the evening hours. This meant that Saturday night I got about two hours sleep...and Jonna didn’t get much more. It also meant loading the van to the gills both days, unloading and setting up at the swap meet, tearing down and loading again in the afternoon, and coming home, unpacking, sorting and finding additional stuff to take the next day and doing it all over again. I ache, therefore I am.

This is what happens when two unreconstructed packrats decide to divest themselves of a major portion of their possessions - the house explodes!

We did very well, though. We sold a bunch of stuff both days and the extra cash will help keep us going - and so far the only thing we sold that we’ll probably miss is the armadillo. As the journal progresses and as we add items to our Walking Sale here, you’re going to discover that our worldly goods consist of an eclectic (many would say eccentric) conglomeration of, well, really weird items. One is our collection of animals. No particular media - some pottery, some wood, some stuffed, etc. But we have everything from aardvark to zebra - usually only one of each, but a few extra dogs (of course) sheep and giraffes. Jonna loves giraffes. Sometime we’ll have to tell the story about taking our giraffe home from D.C. on the plane. Anyway, we sold our armadillo - the first of our menagerie to go.

Today will be no less busy, even though I have the rare day off from work. I’ve been playing phone tag with a reporter from the San Diego Union Tribune, which will probably be the first major media coverage the walk will get whenever we manage to get together. Jonna and I made the decision very early on that if what we’re doing manages to get media attention along the way, we’ll gladly sit down and talk with anyone who wants to do a story about the walk...except anyone from Fox news. For obvious reasons, I think. Anyway, back to work. A little over a month to go. Tell your friends, tell your neighbors. Let’s be heard.

September 28: Dark days indeed. I don’t know who I’m more upset with right now - the Opportunist Occupying the Oval Office whose over-reaching is not-so-slowly but very surely transforming our democracy into a totalitarian state, or our Congress, which seems to be of the notion that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are sorta neat examples of calligraphy, but not of much significance beyond that. Today Congress deemed it just fine to suspend habeas corpus. I don’t want to go into a big lecture or history lesson here, but there are a few things I really think I should point out for the sake of those who aren’t particularly alarmed by this development:

In our nation’s history, habeas corpus has only been suspended once before this. Abraham Lincoln did it during the Civil War. But here’s a point to ponder. Lincoln subsequently stated that, of all the decisions he had to make during the course of the war, his decision to suspend habeas corpus was the one he regretted most.

Again for those who may not yet grasp the full meaning of this, it means that Congress has granted the OOOO the right to imprison anyone - American citizen or otherwise - without bringing charges, without right to counsel, and with no limitation on the length of that imprisonment. All the OOOO has to do is declare that an individual is an enemy combatant or a supporter of terrorism. He does not have to offer any proof - just make the declaration - and poof! - a citizen disappears. Leave us ponder this for just a moment. The OOOO and any number of members of his administration have repeatedly and forcefully declared that if you don’t agree with him, then you’re on the side of the terrorists. Take me, for instance. I certainly don’t agree with what’s going on - I’ve made that pretty obvious by now. According to the rhetoric of the OOOO, that means I’m supporting the terrorists. And that means, if this latest lunacy is permitted to stand, that he will have the authority to toss me immediately into jail without ever charging me with any sort of crime and with no limit whatsoever to the ability to hold me without charges. I’m not making this up. Dissent is now a crime punishable by imprisonment without either trial or limit. Is it possible this could happen in America? It just did. But I’m an American citizen - I know my rights. Well, I know what they were. I just lost one - a very, very big one. Unless the Supreme Court still retains sufficient wisdom to blast this insanity out of the water, we have just seen a large section of pavement laid on the path to a totalitarian state - and it should make every single citizen’s blood run cold.

And it points once again to how crucial the thing I’m trying to do is. All of this is based on the OOOO’s retention of war powers and the illusion that he is a wartime president. If we are not in fact at war, then the whole terrorism thing must be treated as what is actually is - a dragnet to capture criminals and put their criminal operation out of business. And if it is seen as what it properly is, then those captured or imprisoned in the dragnet are not enemy combatants - they are criminals, subject not to military tribunals or wartime codes, but to criminal charges, the rules and procedures of the criminal justice system and the penalties which apply. And if we are not at war, then the signing statements the OOOO has been blithely applying to essentially every piece of legislation since he gained office exempting himself from complying with the legislation on the grounds that he is a wartime president become meaningless, and our OOOO has to find a way to do things that falls within the bounds of law - just like the rest of us. I want to remind everyone at this point that this is a person who ran for office thumping the Rule of Law bible at every turn, and ever since has gone to great lengths to exempt himself from that rule.

I’m not saying that we don’t need some special rules formulated for dealing with terrorists. Perhaps we do. But I am saying - again - that it is both nonsensical and dangerous to call - or to even think of - the effort to defuse terrorism as a war. And it is far beyond dangerous to give the executive branch the power to (a) declare who is and is not a terrorist and (b) based solely on that declaration, incarcerate a person indefinitely. If we do need special rules to deal with terrorism, let’s clear the table - put the war powers back where they belong, stop pretending this is a war - and sit down and conscientiously produce a structure to properly deal with the problem. But for heaven’s sake, let’s stop sitting back and watching while we’re being stripped of everything that makes us American! That is what - in my own very small way - I am trying to do. Won’t you please join with me? Thank you.

September 25: We spent the afternoon participating in a war protest downtown. Considering that we had encountered little in the way of publicity for it, we thought there was an excellent turnout. Jonna jumped right into it, passing out little flyers announcing my walk and cards with the website address on them. I still have a hard time doing things like that - guess I’ll just have to get better at it. The protest involved some civil disobedience and wound up with three participants being arrested. We learned later on that they were all simply ticketed and released. I thought the police did their job very well. At least from what I saw, they treated all of us with respect and courtesy. Certainly the most moving thing to me was a man - and I regret that I did not learn his name - whose son was killed in Iraq. He silently carried a sign with a picture of his son, a Marine. The sign read, "Bush lied - my son died." How he could have carried that sign, so quietly, so respectfully, is beyond my comprehension - he is living every parent’s nightmare. The police, very wisely, did not confront or restrict him in any way.

Being at the protest allowed me to deliver the very first purchase from our Walking Sale page - a Tibetan singing bowl bought by Bob Davis as a gift for his wife...and Bob paid me twice what we were asking for it! Thank you, Bob! I’m sure you and your wife will enjoy the bowl.

Becky has rearranged the Journal page, so I hope I can remember to add tonight’s post at the top of the page rather than at the bottom. More changes will be coming soon.

As we near the one month mark until I begin my walk I find myself conflicted by the circumstances around me. On the one hand, I am heartened daily as I hear more and more people saying the same things I have been saying for years now. People are beginning to speak out - and speak out forcefully. Truth is slowly coming to light. This weekend the National Intelligence report came out, noting that our actions in Iraq have strengthened the Al Qaeda criminals and murderers, leaving us less secure than we were prior to the invasion of Iraq. I have only one word in comment: "Duh!" Then tonight we caught Keith Olbermann’s commentary on Countdown, where he minced no words in castigating this administration and this president as the worst since James Buchanan - and I had to wonder, could James Buchanan have really been that bad? Thank you, Mr. Olbermann - and may your tribe increase. The closing words of his commentary were, "And you have now tried to hide your failures, by blaming your predecessor.

"And now you exploit your failure, to rationalize brazen torture which doesn’t work anyway; which only condemns our soldiers to water_boarding; which only humiliates our country further in the world; and which no true American would ever condone, let alone advocate.

If you’ve been keeping up with my journal, the words sound a bit familiar, don’t they?

On the other hand I am a bit disappointed in that, of all the groups, organizations and individuals we have sent announcements to so far, the one group from which we have not had one single response is the churches. Not one. Our friend Margo, from Chalice Unitarian Universalist, has been supportive from the very beginning as I’ve mentioned, but beyond her - and a few brief well-wishing emails - we have not had one church organization indicate any willingness to support or get involved in what we’re doing, not one offering an invitation to speak to their members or committees, not one offering to host us for an evening or provide us a place to rest our heads along the journey. Again, I realize I can’t expect much of that until I’m actually underway, but I had truly hoped I would see a greater spark of interest from some of the churches early on.

Tomorrow will be a day to sort through some of the chaos around here and prepare for another swap meet next weekend. We’re going to try Kobey’s down in San Diego this time - a bit more expensive for space rental, but certainly the premier swap meet in the area. Yesterday I picked up some jeans at one of the thrift stores in preparation for the walk. We decided early on that my "uniform" for the walk will be jeans and long-sleeved white dress shirts. I’m guessing that by the time I get to the midwest I’ll be looking for jeans at least one size smaller. Of course, by the time I get to the midwest it will be the middle of winter, so there will be a few layers atop the jeans and shirts. I am not looking forward to that particular aspect of this project. Although I was born and raised and lived all my life up until the turn of the century in climates where I was wazoo deep in snow every winter, I never enjoyed it. I am not a cold weather person. Those who know me well understand that for me to commit myself to something that will see me voluntarily walking through blizzards and freezing rain I either believe with every fiber of my being in what I am doing, or I have gone completely bananas...or both. Pray with me for a mild winter.

September 23: Jonna and I have spent the past two days tending to some of the nuts and bolts of the project. We’ve been converting some of our assets for ready negotiability. In other words, we’ve been getting rid of some of our Stuff. We spent Friday ferreting through the closets and storage sheds to identify the first victims of our assault on our worldly possessions and then stuffed them all in the van. Then we spent the first half of today at the Spring Valley swap meet getting what we could for them. We did pretty well, considering that the swap meet was nothing short of manic. It’s sort of like buzzards swooping down on carrion - and you’re the carrion. For some very odd (and probably non-existent) reason, you have to line up around 5 a.m. to be sure you’re going to get a selling spot at the swap meet, but then they don’t even begin letting you in until around 7:30 a.m. They open the place for buyers at 8, so that means that you have, in essence, zero time to set up the merchandise you brought. So what you wind up with is people literally trying to climb inside your van to gt the first shot at whatever you’ve brought at the same time you’re trying to drag everything out and get it set up so people can see everything you brought. It just about drove Jonna bonkers but, like I said, we did pretty well. We sold a bunch of stuff we’re never going to miss.

I thought the most amusing one of the day was also the one that Jonna had the hardest time parting with. It was a set of old golf clubs that belonged to her dad. Neither one of us golf, but she’s steadfastly refused to get rid of them for sentimental reasons - they had been her dad’s clubs, after all. But I guess she finally decided that a set of golf clubs growing dust and cobwebs in the shed wasn’t really very sentimental, nor much of a remembrance for that matter, and tossed them in the van with the rest of our sacrificial offerings. One of our first browsers spent a moment examining the clubs - which also included a bag and covers for the woods - then offered me three dollars...for the putter. I told him no, that I didn’t want to sell the set piecemeal - if he wanted the putter he’d have to buy the entire set. After a weak attempt at convincing me that surely someone else would come along who wanted the rest of the set he gave up and wandered off.

A few hours later another gentleman came up to me and offered me five dollars...for the putter. I told him the same thing I had told the first man. So he asked me how much I wanted for the entire set. I told him ten dollars. He seemed to think that was reasonable and handed me ten dollars. As I pocketed the bill, he pulled the putter out of the bag and walked off, leaving the rest of the set behind.

I now have this ominous feeling that a month or so from now we’re going to be watching Antiques Road Show and there on the screen will be this man with Jonna’s dad’s putter. We will then discover that this happens to be the very putter General Custer used to shoot a five under at the Little Big Horn Country Club the day before he set out to teach them pesky injuns a thing or two - and it’s worth 18 bazillion dollars. It’s the kind of thing that would happen to us. We’re never going to be the ones picking up an undiscovered Rembrandt at a garage sale - we’ll be the ones who sold it for five bucks because it was just so blessed ugly. Oh well.

We were going to hit the swap meet again tomorrow, but after Jonna’s experience of feeling like a pound of hamburger dropped into a tank full of piranas today, she decided to hold off until next week. Just as well, since I’ve only had about four hours of sleep in the past two days - weekends are busy time for chauffeurs - and could use the rest. Fortunately, I don’t have anything until very late tomorrow, so I should be able to catch up before then.

We’re in the process of making some major decisions as we approach the starting date of the walk, and we’re beginning to get a bit more comfortable with the realization that this is going to wind up becoming a major change in the direction our lives will be taking for some time to come. Jonna still threatens to do me in for coming up with this idea - and still acknowledges that what we’re doing is undoubtedly the right thing to do - sometimes in the same sentence. But she has been greatly fortified by the number of emails we’ve received from people and the number of people we’ve met already who have told us how our courage has inspired them. This sort of affirmation is worth more than I can say, and I’m deeply grateful to all of you who have taken the time to let us know that this means something to you. It means something to us, too.

September 21: Expect to see some major changes to the website in the near future. I’ve handed over design and maintenance of the website to our daughter Becky’s high school class and they’re coming up with some great ideas - some of them are things I’ve been wanting to do and some of them are brand new. I’ve told them that as long as the basic content remains intact they have pretty much a free hand, so who knows what you’ll see next time you visit. Actually, Becky tells me that significant changes are still about a week away, but they’re working on it.

When they told me they wanted to add music to the site I said OK on one condition - that they’d include the option to turn the music OFF! Then she said one of the students even had an idea for what music to use. I told her what her student had suggested before she could even ask me to guess - Edwin Starr’s 1970 classic "War" (What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!). I had to laugh. Sure, it’s great. But it’s also, well - quintessential cliche.

Then Jonna had an absolutely outstanding idea. We happen to have some very musically gifted kids - Dietrich, Becky’s husband Joey, Kari’s husband Joey (yes, we have two Joeys), and Dietrich’s friend Adam - who is very nearly one of our own - are all extremely talented. She thought each of them might like to write and record an original song for the website. We’re going to pitch it to them and see if they’ll take us on. I hope so.

Speaking of young people - where are they? I’ve been wondering that for some time now. Maybe it’s just my personal experience, but it has been feeling like most of the activists out there are on the long-of-tooth and gray-of-beard side. When we attended the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice meeting the other night, I think only one person there was under 40. We need the young people. I was reading Daniel Ellsberg’s speech given in San Francisco recently and he talked about the ultimate significance of the involvement of young people back in the 60s and 70s when the Vietnam War (aka

Iraq

- the Prequel) was tearing us apart. When he published the Pentagon Papers, exposing the lies of the Nixon administration, he acknowledges that he couldn’t have done it - and couldn’t have avoided the FBI - if it wasn’t for the kids. They knew they were risking serious jail time. They knew they could be marked for life. But they believed in truth.

Where are they now? Are they too immersed in video games and internet? Is it that nobody they actually know has come home in a box yet? Is it that the people crafting this state of permanent war have successfully managed - so far - to do it while allowing a vast majority of the American populace to pretend that it isn’t really happening? I don’t know. I think maybe that, just like most adults, they’re afraid to speak out. They’re afraid that theirs will be the only voice. I have a feeling I’ll be meeting lots of them on my walk. I hope I can show them that they’re not alone after all.

September 20: I’ve been asked more than once now (and heard the same question directed at the anti war movement in general) the following question: Suppose that we are again attacked by terrorists on our own soil. Won’t that silence the debate and make what you’re doing irrelevant?

My answer: Not at all - in fact, quite the contrary. Another attack should only strengthen the immediacy of what I’m trying to do. You see, if we are attacked again, it will undoubtedly be by either Al Qaeda sympathizers or some other group of murderous, sociopathic criminals who will not be in any way representative of any state or nation and will attempt to hide their heinous actions behind the illusion of religious or cultural ties. Before it happens, we need to be able to establish clarity as to our response. If we repeat the same disastrous mistake we did after September 11^th and once again declare a "war" against a bunch of criminals, we only lend them credence and gravitas they do not deserve, just as we did for Al Qaeda. If it happens again, we need to find the wisdom to react the way we ought to react to the perpetration of mass murder - an all-out manhunt for those involved with the act and those who would abet and support them. If we discover that the murderers were supported or abetted by a sovereign nation, we still need to refrain from turning it into a war, instead determinedly setting out to form a true global coalition (by the way, whatever happened to the glorious "coalition of the willing"? Hmmm...) of nations to bring relentless and unbearable pressure on the offending nation to turn over those involved in the act. Once we apprehend the criminals, they are treated and tried as they ought to be - not as enemy combatants in a war, but as criminals, tried in criminal courts and sentenced under laws of criminal justice.

In so reacting, we maintain a sense of proportion and reality; we avoid the free-floating anxiety, anger and fear perpetrated on the public by a bogus "war" bogeyman, and we send a real message to like minded misfits - the message we have failed to send for five years - that we will not grant you the global stature you seek; we will not play into your hands. We will treat you as the demented thugs you are. You have committed a crime, not an act of war, and this time we won’t let you get away with pretending it is anything other than a crime, nor will we treat it as anything more or less than a heinous crime ourselves. Your goal is to create chaos - this time we will not allow you to succeed.

By compelling Congress to reclaim its war powers from the executive branch before another attack occurs, we will force our leaders to consider their actions far, far more carefully this time than they did immediately after September 11^th. We will force them to realize the monumentally irresponsible error they committed in granting war powers without limit and without focus to a president who, as it turns out, is more than eager to take every advantage of every ambiguity afforded him. We will remember the truth of the adage our president could not quite wrap his intellect around: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me".

And maybe, just maybe, if we can put an end to the incredibly stupid habit of using war as a metaphor for everything and everything - the war on terror, drugs, poverty, homelessness, AIDs, etc. ad infinitum, we can begin once again to seriously think about what a unique and terribly grave undertaking War is, and begin to finally see it in its proper, deadly, and ultimately inhuman light.

September 18: We’re just back from our meeting with the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice tonight, where we were very warmly received and WTETW was officially endorsed by SDCPJ. Thank you, all! I think we made some very helpful contacts tonight - it’s going to take a while to sort through everything. It’s also looking more and more every day like November 4^th is going to wind up being quite a gathering. I don’t work again until tomorrow evening, so during the day I’m going to have to start talking to whatever officials I need to contact in Lakeside and give them a heads up about what may turn into a larger event than we had ever imagined.

One of the women at the meeting - Lace - was quite enthusiastic about what we’re doing and spent a good deal of time with us helping us prepare for upcoming media contacts. We really appreciated her input and we know this is something we’re going to have to be ready for, but I have to tell the truth here...I’m really not looking forward to it. I know I’m going to have to distill things down into sound bites, three point messages, nine second exposures. It doesn’t mean I have to like it. After all, the whole sound bite thing is nearly anathema to what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to get people to think seriously about things for more than nine seconds at a time. We’re trying to get people to pay attention to what they’re being told. We’re trying to get people to stop thinking in slogans and start thinking about what those slogans mean - for us right now and for the future of our country.

And while I’m on that subject, let’s tackle another one tonight. "We’ll stand down when

Iraq

is able to stand up." Sounds noble. Sounds compassionate, even. Let’s try the shoe-on-the-other-foot thing for a minute. Those who are familiar with our country’s history are well aware that the support and involvement of

France

was crucial to our victory when we fought our war for independence. Let’s just suppose that when we were fresh from the battlefields and savoring the first few moments of our nation’s very existence, the leaders of

France

met with those who became our Founding Fathers and said:

Look, you guys are new at this. You haven’t had any experience in running a republic. You’ve already split off into separate colonies, or "states", n’est ce pas? This whole thing could come falling down around your ears, and that wouldn’t be good for either you or us. So we’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’ll stay right here for a while until we’re sure you have your feet on the ground. You don’t have to do a thing. We’ll bring our own contractors in to build the infrastructure you’re going to need, and they’ll bring their own subcontractors in to make sure everything is done right. While we’re at it, we’ll be building the biggest fort we’ve ever built - probably somewhere down around the Potomac. Oh yes, we’re sure there are plenty of British sympathizers still out there, so we’ll be busy rooting out those evildoers so we can make you safe. We’ll also be disbanding your military - heaven knows where some of their allegiances lie - and then we’ll put together a new military for you and train them ourselves. And then, someday in the future - it could take quite a while, you know - when you’re ready to stand up for yourselves, we’ll stand down. Honest. Trust us.

Think about it. How long do you suppose we would have put up with it? How long would it have been until every French soldier or contractor or bureaucrat in sight had a target on his back? How long would it have been before we kicked every single one of them back across the Atlantic? Tell me if this is not precisely the same thing we’re saying to

Iraq

. Tell me one reason why we should not expect the same reaction from them as we would have exhibited had someone done it to us. And tell me if a nation that has the gall to do something like that does not come across to the rest of the world as pathologically arrogant and stupefyingly ignorant of the inescapable consequences of their ill-conceived actions. That’s us, folks. That’s the U S of A at this particular moment in history. Is it something you’re proud of? Is it something you think your grandchildren will be proud of? If so, then you’re just not paying attention. If not, then it’s about time we changed it, don’t you think?

P.S. I’d like to rephrase - for accuracy - a question often asked recently. The question: How much of your freedom are you willing to give up for a time to secure your safety? The more accurate question would be: How much of the reality of your civil liberties, your constitutional rights, your freedom as an American are you willing to relinquish - perhaps permanently - to buy for yourself an illusion of safety? For in reality, there is not one single freedom or right which, once relinquished, you won’t have to fight long and hard to regain. And there is not one single freedom - nor any amount of them - that you could relinquish that would guarantee your safety. Those who want you to give up your rights because they say doing so will make you safer (when in reality they just find all those rights to be so damn inconvenient) are selling you snake oil ladies and gentlemen - and it’s dangerous stuff.

September 17: We hit a milestone on the 15^th - over 100 visitors to our site on Friday! I am certain that is due to the fact that Carol Jahnkow of San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice put our announcement out on their email list. Thanks, Carol and SDCPJ!

Jonna and I took our oldest granddaughter and the guys (Finn & Spoof) to a Kids Walk for Peace at Balboa Park today. We had scrambled late last night and early this morning to print up some calling cards and flyers for WTETW to pass out to people there. It was a beautiful day and a good introduction to activism for our granddaughter. She and Jonna took charge of handing out flyers and cards while I tended to the guys. It was good to see Jonna in action again. She’s a warhorse (peacehorse?) from way back, having been deeply involved in the peace movement in the 60s and 70s - and she hasn’t lost her passion for it. She elbowed her way in everywhere handing out material and explaining what her crackpot husband is about to do. Both my ladies were very well received by everyone - and Finn & Spoof got more than their fair share of attention as well - they always do.

Tomorrow evening I’ve been invited to present my project to a meeting of United for Peace and Justice in San Diego. I never know quite what to say, so I just let whatever comes out come out. Jonna will be there with me to keep me on a close lead, though, so I don’t get too deep into a rant. Actually, the way that works out is if I don’t go into a rant, she probably will. Oh well, if we accomplish nothing else, we usually wind up leaving people with no doubt that we’re passionate about what we’re doing.

I had a brain drizzle (never quite get as full blown as brain storms) the other day. We know we’re going to wind up selling our Jeep to help finance this (although I really, really, really hate to part with it!), and I thought maybe we ought to do that now. That way I could stop working or work only part time and use the proceeds to keep things going until the walk begins. This would free me up to do a lot more work with the website, answer emails, put together plans, scout out speaking opportunities, etc. It turns out Jonna had the same thought, but is counting on the proceeds from the Jeep to keep us running through November and part of December. So unless some more generous angels find their way to us I’ll be plugging away at the job as long as I can and continue to do the rest of the stuff whenever I’m able to find the time.

While most everything about this has been going even better than we had ever thought possible, the one thing that is still worrisome is the financial aspect. We have had exactly two donations so far. True, they were both quite generous, but they were the only two. I expected from the beginning that we wouldn’t see much of anything in the way of financial support until I was at least several hundred miles into the journey, but I guess with as well as everything else is going, I sort of thought we’d see a bit more in the way of smaller contributions by now. I’m not going to worry about it. I know that we can finance the whole thing by selling the house - and neither of us have any compunctions about doing that if we must, but I’m sure we’re both hoping that will wind up being a possibility rather than a necessity. For one thing, by the time we’re in a position where we’ll have to do that I’ll be a thousand miles or more down the road - and I’d hate to leave Jonna to go through that all by herself. This is going to be as much - and quite probably more - workload on her in the long run as it will be on me and I really don’t want to put her in a position where even more is heaped upon her. She’s a strong woman, but this was my idea and it’s hardly fair that so much of the nuts and bolts burden should fall on her. Of course, I realized right from the start that when this is all said and done, I’m going to wind up in the position of owing her one in perpetuity - certainly for the rest of our lives and quite probably through several subsequent incarnations.

I was sitting here trying to think of whether it was time for another current events rant and decided I’d save it for later. I promised to brag on the guys a bit and I probably won’t have much time to do that when the walk gets underway, so I think I’ll do it now. Our guys are Finn and Spoof. Or Finnegan and Spoofendifer (don’t ask me - Jonna named him. It’s something her uncle used to call the kids when they were being ornery. We just hope it isn’t a vulgarity in some Germanic tongue). Or Redwinds Highland Spirit and Redwind’s Highland Sprite. They’re Shetland Sheepdogs - kennel brothers - that is to say, from the same breeder but not from the same parents. Finn is two and a half and Spoof is one and a half. Finn is a moosebutt - far too big to be shown in AKC conformation rings. Spoof is right about at the maximum size for a Sheltie to enter the show ring.

Jonna and I have owned and loved many dogs through our lives. When our previous dog, Sunshine - a terrier/traveling salesman mix - died at the ripe old age of 18 it took us about a year and a half before we were ready for another dog (we grow quite attached to our dogs and grieve them deeply). We decided to try a purebred and thought a Sheltie would be a good match for us - and that’s how we wound up with Finn. And since we got a breed that is known to be very good at such things as obedience and agility and herding, we thought we might try our hand at some of that stuff for the very first time.

As it turns out, Finn is a canine genius. Really. We ruled out agility right away, because Finn is just about the most mellow, laid back dog you’ve ever seen. I picked up a book on obedience training, and by the time he turned 6 months old, Finn had his first win in the obedience ring. He had his first AKC Obedience title by the time he was nine months old. At that time, we decided to have him tested to see if he had the instinct for herding. He was a natural. At ten months, he had his first herding title. He now has five herding titles and is working on his sixth and seventh. One of the things about my pending walk that pains me deeply is that it means Finn’s herding career has had to go on hold. Several judges have already told me he has the potential to become a herding champion, and I don’t doubt that. But the most important thing is that he absolutely loves herding the sheep, and I hate to deprive him of that while I’m walking, but it has to be. When the walk is over we’ll get back into it and pick up where we left off.

Then there is Spoof. We thought it would be a good idea for Finn to have a buddy and we were right. After an initial and expected short period of jealousy, they get along great together - chasing each other in and out of the house and romping and rolling around - except when they’re sleeping or trying to convince us that they are both about to drop dead from starvation. But where we sometimes call Finn "Finn the Wonder Dog", we call Spoof "Spoof the Wonder-What-He’s-Up-To-Now" dog. Finn glows. Spoof sparkles. Finn has herding and obedience titles. Spoof has finally learned to poop in the right places. Not that Spoof isn’t every bit as smart as Finn - he is. He just needs to learn to use his powers for good. And most of the time he seems to have too much fun finding ways to get into trouble to consider that yet.

I guess I should also mention that they’re both drop-dead gorgeous. That’s not prejudiced opinion - it’s simple observation. Almost invariably when we take them out walking in public places, we wind up at some point being surrounded by people who want to pet them or have their pictures taken with them. I’m not kidding. And Finn in particular looks like a bit smaller sized version of Lassie. We had never realized what a cross-cultural phenomenon Lassie is until we got Finn. We have a habit of counting the number of times we hear "Lassie!" when we walk the guys. San Diego gets lots of international visitors, and it doesn’t matter where they come from, they all know Lassie - European, Chinese, Japanese, South American, African, all parts of Asia - we’ve heard "Lassie!" from people who didn’t know another word of English.

September 15: Busy! Just a quick note tonight - an open memo for all members of congress who have voted to pass legislation that would permit interrogation methods which are barred by the Geneva Convention (and thus, in the eyes of most of the civilized world) as cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment, as well as "outrages upon personal dignity.":

2. Torture, in whatever form and notwithstanding whatever imagined justification, is the most immoral, inhuman, unethical act imaginable.

3. If we step outside of the boundaries of the Geneva Convention, we immediately lose any basis to criticize, condemn or correct those who would do the same to our own people.

4. (And most important, I think, in respect to those I’m addressing) - We, the People - our nation, our ethos, our values - DO NOT PERMIT TORTURE!!! If you have voted to allow deviance from the Geneva Convention, you have completely lost touch with those you represent and need to immediately step down from public service. There is no debate on this. There are no qualifications, no what-ifs, no arguments. Up until now, your reluctance to do the job for which we hired you, your inattention to the excesses and over-reaching of our executive branch, and your narrow minded focus on what you seem to think will play well in the polls have merely been chipping away at our civil liberties, our freedom and - yes - our ultimate security. But with this vote you are now beginning to chip away at our nation’s very soul. Stop. Now. Walk away before you can do any more damage and let someone who remembers what it means to be an American take your place.

September 13: Jonna and I drove the first leg of the route today from Lakeside to Julian to establish definitive parameters for the first few days of the walk. We also decided on a start time for the beginning of the walk at Lindo Lake Park in Lakeside on November 4^th. We’re going to ask those who want to join us on that day to meet at the park at 8 a.m. and plan to begin the walk at 9 a.m. The first day’s walk will take us from Lindo Lake Park to the intersection of Poway Road and route 67, where the Iron Mountain trail begins - a distance of 9.4 miles. The second day’s walk will be from that point to downtown Ramona, where route 78 joins route 67, another 9.4 mile leg. On the third day, the walk will be from there to Deer Canyon Road on route 78 - an 11 mile stretch. Tentatively, most of that day’s walk will be on Old Julian Highway until it rejoins 78, as there is far less traffic so it will be a safer walk. The fourth day will then be from the intersection of 78 and Deer Canyon Road to the intersection of routes 78 and 79 in Julian, another 11 mile leg. For now, that’s as definitive as we can be.

When we returned from our research trip, there was some great news in our email. First, Carol Jahnkow of the Peace Resource Center and the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice wanted to know if I’d be willing to speak at a meeting on the 18^th (of course!), and then Jackie Wagner emailed us to let us know that she’s taken the liberty of devoting a section of her website, ProtestIsPatriotism.org, to my walk. I got online and checked out Jackie’s work - and it’s fantastic! She’s set up a number of features that we’ve been talking about putting on our site but lack the expertise to implement. She’s also designed a neat logo and even has begun offering T-shirts and tote bags and such with the logo on them - profits to be donated to the walk. We’ve been meeting some real angels - in the truest sense of the word. Today happened to be my 57^th birthday, and I couldn’t have asked for better presents.

September 12: Story time. I lost my dad to cancer when I was in my mid twenties and he was only fifty-two. It was devastating. I not only loved him deeply, but still consider him to be one of the most intelligent people I have ever known. He loved life, was a very spiritual person and had a tremendous sense of humor. I believe everyone who knew my dad had great respect and admiration for him.

I was dealing with the unfairness of his death at such an early age when a neighbor said something to me that, I must confess, gave me great comfort at the time. She told me that when someone like my dad, who had so much to offer, dies so prematurely it must be because God had some very important work for him to do in heaven. Understand that in my early twenties I was very accepting of all the conventional interpretations and trappings of mainline western Christianity and not given much to critical or analytical thinking in the social arena so, like I said, I found these words to be very comforting - something to hang onto when my spirit was searching for a "why".

Several years later and quite a while before I entered the ministry I met a young man who was searching for truth and meaning in his life. We had many conversations and in one of them he told me that he had rejected spirituality and the entire concept of God in his quest - and he told me why. He said that when he was a teenager one of his close friends was killed in a car accident and, of course, he attended the funeral. During the funeral, the presiding pastor was searching for words of comfort for family and friends, and intoned that if God had called this young man home so soon it must have been because there was important work God needed him for in heaven. My friend said that at that instant he thought, "What a greedy, insensitive, arrogant God this is! What kind of God would cause this sort of grief to this boy’s family and friends? What kind of God has so little consideration for us that he would cheat someone of their life, destroy their mother and father - and all because there was something ‘important’ to do in heaven? How omnipotent and all powerful is this God who has to kill kids to get his work done for him?" He left the church that day and never returned.

When he told me his story I realized immediately that his reaction was perfectly normal and proper - and I never forgot what he taught me. Later, when I entered the ministry, I carefully avoided using such simplistic platitudes, having learned that if we take a moment to scratch the surface, they often say something very dark and terrible.

I tell this story because I believe we need to stop talking - and thinking - in slogans and platitudes. A few weeks ago I happened to catch a short interview on TV of a mother who had lost her son in

Iraq

. Somehow, I could read this woman’s soul in her eyes. She had been destroyed by the loss of her son and had gone through that most horrible nightmare that any parent ever faces and no parent should ever have to bear - that of burying their child. Her unceasing pain, her heartache and devastation were all over her, but toward the end of the interview, with all of that still flowing from every ounce of her being, she declared that her son’s sacrifice was honorable and worthwhile because "he was fighting them over there so we won’t have to fight them over here."

It was her sole remaining strand of justification, and she was holding onto it for her very life. I would never, ever take that lifeline away from her because for right now - and possibly for a very long time to come - it is the only thing that will allow her to get up in the morning and make it through another day. But for the many out there who are not depending on this platitude to maintain a slim hold on sanity but rather employing it merely as a justification or righteous reason why we are doing what we are doing in Iraq, I would like to stop a minute and think about what we are actually saying when we use this slogan. What are we saying about who we are? What are we saying about our ethics, our values, and how we perceive the rest of the world?

Well, let’s try this analysis: What we are saying is that if we do not wish to have the innocent blood of our citizens spilled, it is perfectly alright for us to go essentially anywhere we desire - even into another sovereign nation - draw our perceived enemies there, and wreak horrific slaughter and destruction on strangers in a strange land rather than face the possibility that our own citizens may be harmed. What we are saying is that we are somehow more valuable, more deserving of protection than anyone else in the world. What we are saying is that we somehow have the innate right to do whatever we want, wherever we want regardless of what impact our actions have on others because, well, because we and our interests are somehow superior to them and their interests. What we are saying is that, outside of the borders or our own country (and perhaps even within those borders) we are the most arrogant, immoral, unethical sociopaths ever to wander this planet - with the possible exception of the Roman Empire at the height of its pride.

This may not be what we think we are saying. It may not be what we want to say. But like those words years ago that for a time comforted me while forever scarring the perceptions of my more perceptive friend, you can bet the entire farm that those around the world who are watching us and scratching one iota beneath the surface of our slogans are seeing America in a whole new light - or I guess I should say a whole new darkness.

Let me approach it from a completely different angle for a minute - a much simpler, more direct angle. Let’s just put the shoe on the other foot. We are well aware that there are any number of neo-nazi and other deeply anti-Semitic groups alive and well in this country, demonstrating their manic ignorance at every opportunity. Let us suppose that one day, the leaders of Israel come to us and say, "Look, we know for certain that there’s a group of neo-nazis operating in Cleveland who would like nothing more than to murder every Jew in the world, and we think there’s also an active cell in Houston. So we’re going to come over and bomb Cleveland to ashes and we’re going to conduct door-to-door urban warfare in Houston to seek out and destroy these evildoers. If we do any collateral damage to innocent civilians well, it will be worth it, because it will be better to fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here."

How would we react? What would we say to

Israel

(or anyone else who proposed such an operation on our soil)? Would we permit such insanity? Yet this is precisely and exactly what we are doing in Iraq and we don’t seem to have any problem with it...and we don’t even bother to try to understand what impact this has on the rest of the world’s perception of us.

The sooner we lose this slogan the better - for us. And when we finally figure out what we’re telling the world when we say this, we had better begin looking a lot more closely at the various other sound bites we’re using to defend our indefensible hubris.

September 11: No words about the fifth anniversary here - there’s plenty of that everywhere else. Another first today - our first piece of "snail mail" to our PO box today - including a generous contribution. Thank you, John!

And some very, very encouraging things today. At long, long last I am beginning to hear people talking about what’s going on in at least similar terms to what I’ve been saying for so long and what I’m trying to address with my petition. As I write this I’m watching a show on the Discovery Times channel featuring a town hall discussion moderated by Ted Koppel centering on the price - or cost - of security (or the illusion of it). It should be shown in every high school class in the country. People are finally realizing that the "war on terror" isn’t a war at all. People are finally beginning to see that by framing this in the language of war, we have elevated such radical splinter factions as Al Qaeda from the murderous sociopaths they are and legitimized them in the eyes of the world. People are finally talking about the ever more conspicuous push by the opportunists in the executive branch to create an essentially imperial executive branch that would retain power, authority and a position above the law indefinitely in the name of fighting an indefinite "war". People are finally beginning to talk about who we believe ourselves to be as a nation and whether what we are doing in the world accurately reflects our national self image. All I can say is that it’s about time - and I hope what I’m going to be doing will serve to further these discussions in some small way.

September 10: A Memo to the Opportunist Occupying the Oval Office (or OOOO, for short)

Sir: In the not too distant past you made the statement, "I’m the decider." Excuse me, sir, but unless our country has already slid much farther down the path toward a dictatorship than I had even feared, you are NOT the decider. We, the People are the decider. We always have been, and we are going to do whatever is necessary to ensure that we always will be. You, sir, are a civil servant. We, the People make the decisions. You, our servant, don’t even have to like them. Your job is to act on the decisions we make to the best of your ability as our representative to the world at large. It is not your place to decide - and it is about time that We, the People reminded you of that.

More recently you have declared unequivocally that our sons and daughters will not be leaving

Iraq

as long as you are in office. Again, sir, that is not your decision. You cannot know - nor can we - what circumstances will present themselves one month or six months or a year from now, therefore you cannot say now what our situation in Iraq will be two years from now - and to presume that you have either the right or the ability to make such a statement is the height of arrogance. We, the People will decide where our sons and daughters will be one month from now or one year from now, and if we tell you it is time for them to come home, you will immediately and without argument bring them home. It is not for you to tell us that we will be in

Iraq

tomorrow - it is for us to tell you - and we are extremely disturbed that you seem to keep forgetting that.

One of your predecessors in the Oval Office, Mr. Harry Truman, used to keep a placard on his (actually, our) desk that said, "The Buck Stops Here." You seem to suffer from a misconception of what that placard meant. To Mr. Truman - and most other civil servants who have sat at that desk - the placard meant that the ultimate responsibility for the actions and the welfare of our nation rests squarely on the shoulders of the person occupying that position. It seems, however, that you have taken it to mean that the ultimate authority, an authority which will permit no dissent, disagreement or even questioning, belongs to you. In this you are most gravely mistaken. The ultimate authority in this country belongs to We, the People. For some time now you have seemed more than eager to claim any and all authority you think that placard refers to, and you have been far more than reluctant to accept any of the responsibility the sign actually refers to. It is well past time for you to get it straight - We, the People are losing our patience with you.

September 9: While I was at work today, Jonna was on the phone to our daughter and, of course, our youngest granddaughter. She told our granddaughter about my plans to walk across the

United States

, something her parents hadn’t mentioned to her yet. After an initial period of being certain that grandma was joking, and only dispelled by confirmation from her mother, our granddaughter became quite upset. Grampa shouldn’t do this, she told Jonna - he might get hurt! Jonna tells me she was quite upset and I’m going to have to call her tomorrow and talk to her.

I’m still trying to process this. I haven’t gotten over worrying about my kids and grandkids on a fairly constant basis. I’m not sure what to do with the idea of my grandchildren worrying about me. Heck, it’s been ten years since the birth of our first granddaughter and I still have a hard time thinking of myself as grandpa. The hair is sparse and gray and random parts are a bit creaky some mornings, but I’m still twenty-something somewhere in my brain (Jonna will tell you that I’m perpetually twelve, but that’s another story).

Grandkids - Two are just learning to toddle so they don’t have an opinion. One is deeply concerned for my well-being and one is just plain excited.

Kids - Two seem to be really proud of what I’m doing but are very worried about my safety; one thinks it’s really cool; one understands why I’m doing it but wishes I’d figure out some saner way to occupy myself and is also worried; and the jury is still out on the fifth. I think there is general agreement among them that they should probably come after me with a butterfly net, but they realize it wouldn’t do any good.

There have actually been a number of times in my life - more, I think, than most people encounter - when for reasons of conscience or a sense of the necessity to do what is right - I have found myself compelled to step outside of my comfort zone, my cocoon of middle class American safety and security. Some of those times things have worked out well. Sometimes they have not. But I have never regretted having taken the risk, and I know I would feel like so much waste of skin and bone if I had never done the things that have placed me in uncertain circumstances. Maybe that’s why I have a hard time with all of our politicians telling us that they know better than the next one how to keep us safe. It’s too bad not a single one of them has the good sense to stand up and say that, in the final analysis, nobody can keep us completely safe and that the wisest course of action would be to stop fueling what has become a national obsession and get used to the idea that none of us were born into this world with a guarantee stamped on our butts.

In fact, it occurs to me that too much security drags down both the potential and the richness of our lives. How many people only do what they do for a living because they fear losing the security of the status quo should they try something new? How many people live where they live because it’s more secure than pulling up roots and moving to someplace new and unfamiliar? How many of us fear people of other races or other cultures because we’ve never stepped out of our circle of familiar homogenous friends and acquaintances and customs to actually get to know and try to understand someone from a completely different place and background? How much adventure, how much growth, how much wonder is lost in the name of security. It seems to me that, given what we must sacrifice for it, security is highly over-rated.

September 6: We sent announcements to about twenty area churches today and are still working on our list of individuals to contact. In order to help raise the money we’re going to need to do this we’ve put a good number of books up for sale on Half.com and have already had pretty good luck selling those. Tomorrow I’ll be setting up a little photo studio on the dining room table to photograph a number of our collectables and antiques and other strange stuff that we plan to put up on Ebay to raise some money. Jonna’s working on plans to set up for a day at either the Spring Valley swap meet or at Kobey’s in San Diego to sell another batch of stuff within the next couple of weeks. As she’s been going through everything I think our closets are now cleaner and more organized than they have been since we moved here.

One of the concerns that’s been in the back of my mind since the formation of this idea has been for my own personal safety as I do this walk. Our nation is so politically polarized right now that I have little doubt that if I wind up attracting any attention, there will be those who, in the mistaken belief that this is a political statement, would wish to do me harm. It’s something I’m going to have to live with. Yes, I certainly have major grievances with our current president and the people surrounding him who are manipulating us in extraordinarily dangerous ways. But I do not consider him to be a Republican (and most real Republicans will heartily agree with me), and I harbor no ill will toward those who call themselves Republicans, know what it means to be one, and act like it.

I believe that as a nation, we are in the midst of a crisis of grief arising from September 11, 2001. The trouble is, if you’re familiar with Elizabeth Kubler Ross’ definitive analysis of the grief process, we are stuck firmly in the anger stage - and being grossly manipulated to remain there by those who view it as advantageous. Anger - and fear - are controlling our society at the moment. And it works to the advantage of some because while we are angry we tend not to think too clearly, and while we are fearful we tend to be easily controlled and manipulated. And that is precisely what is happening.

This is not theory - it is observation. I work with people who represent a general range of political affinity, religious beliefs and so forth. And more than once, when news has come on the television at the shop of more deaths of our sons and daughters in

Iraq

or more bombings or more atrocities, I have heard people react by declaring, "We should just kill them all!" These are not crazy people - they are good, loving, ethical everyday citizens. But their anger - their rage - controls them. If I try, or anyone else tries to talk to them about what they’re saying it does no good. Somewhere inside they know what they’re saying is completely contrary to everything they hold to be right and true and good, and I know for certain that they are aware of that, but they do not want to let go of their rage long enough to think about it. I recognize that I can’t approach people in that place - either at work or as I walk - by discussing the focus of their anger. They are going to have to find a way beyond it at some point. But what I am hoping I will be able to do is to try to shed some light on what our present course of action says about us as a nation, what sort of world it will produce for those who follow behind us, and what sort of danger our entire system of democracy is facing if we do not act to put things back into balance very, very quickly.

As I said, my walk is not a political statement. I was born and raised in a staunch Republican family. I know what Republicans stand for. And I can tell you for certain that the people running our executive branch at this moment are not Republicans. I have tried to come up with a properly descriptive label and the one I think fits best is that they are Opportunists. They’ll wear the Republican mantle because it serves their purposes. They will mouth the words of ethics, family values and morality, but their actions totally belie those words - the words serve their purposes; actually living them does not. In some cases, such as economics, the classic Republican agenda does not suit them at all, so they simply abandon it. If I were a Republican, I think I would be more outraged about what’s going on right now than if I were a Democrat.

And what is the Opportunist agenda? I can’t pretend to know the details, but I do know what is at the center of it. It is all about power and control of this nation and, ultimately, the world. There are those who would say that it is about profit - about wealth - and I would not disagree except to observe that in the end, wealth is merely a means to obtain power and control, so it is actually a secondary rather than a primary concern. The bothersome little secret the Opportunists are trying to get around is that a nation based on democratic principles does not permit any one group or any one person to acquire the kind of power and control they seek to acquire...unless we allow them to change the fundamental way our country operates. And at this moment that is exactly what we’re allowing them to do. Once upon a time we abhorred such a concept as a pre-emptive strike. Once upon a time we would rise up as one and proclaim without reserve that this nation would never stoop to such depths as condoning torture or indefinite imprisonment without charges or counsel. Once upon a time we would have shed blood in the streets before we would allow any public servant (remember that our president and Congress are public servants?) to acquire unlimited, unchecked power to break or ignore literally every and any law that forms the soul of our nation. All of those things have now happened. Have we had enough yet? Is it time to take back the reins of our nation which rightly and only belong in the hands of We the People? Will we do it while we are still in a place where we can do it peacefully and rationally? I pray so.

September 5: A very busy and quite incredible day today. I had to get up at 4:30 this morning to chauffeur a lady to Los Angeles, wait for her all day, then bring her back. I got back into town at 4:30 p.m. and got home by 5:30 to hurry and get ready to go speak to the local chapter of Veterans for Peace - the very first opportunity I’ve had to present this to a group, thanks to the interest of president Dave Patterson. Despite the fact that I have oodles of experience at public speaking - being a former pastor - I was quite nervous about this. Jonna came along for support - and to make sure I didn’t fall all over my tongue.

I needn’t have worried. Veterans working for peace causes are a very special group of people. As Jonna noted on the way home, she’s worked with peace groups all of her life and on many occasions has been very deeply involved, but veterans are in a class by themselves. They have been there. When they speak out or work for peace they are not coming from youthful idealism or radical activism or political agendas. They speak from having been through personal experience - some of it inexpressably horrible - and they know what war does to human beings, and they know that there must always be a better way.

We were very, very well received and we made two definite contacts for other opportunities to speak and began to talk about setting up a network to provide places to stay and groups to meet with as I walk across the country. It was an absolutely wonderful way to begin our public presentation of our project.

When the meeting was over, one of the members came up to us and handed me a check. True to my chauffeur’s training, I didn’t look at it when she handed it to me, but thanked her most sincerely for her generosity. This was, after all, our very first monetary contribution to our project, so it was very special. She said she had visited our website and felt that we were doing a wonderful thing. As we were driving home, I took the check out of my pocket and took a look at it. Jonna nearly fell out of the van! I’m not mentioning names or amounts here, but you know who you are - and you are an absolute angel! From the very beginning of this Jonna has been pretty well tied in knots, fearing that we’ll do this and nobody will pay any attention...nobody will care. Tonight, suddenly, that has changed a bit and for the first time Jonna is saying, "We can really do this." Yes, we can. There will be down times to come and up times to come. But this night will be remembered. You’ve empowered us. Thank you cannot begin to be enough, but Thank You!

Also confirmed today that we had indeed been offered the use of a bus by a wonderful lady in Ramona. She understood perfectly when we had to tell her that Jonna just can’t handle something that big, but we are profoundly grateful for the offer. I’ll be looking forward to meeting her in Ramona in the very, very early part of my walk.

We’ve already decided that our official starting date will actually be a Saturday - either right before or right after the first of November. We’ll make a final decision tomorrow and reflect that here on the website. For tonight, we’re both pretty much emotionally exhausted and need to get some rest to prepare for another busy day tomorrow.

September 3: I think the emotional impact of the past couple of weeks finally caught up with me today and I pretty much collapsed. Fortunately I had most of the day off. Unfortunately I spent a good part of it trying to get out of bed. I did manage to get it together in time to help Jonna clean up the van a bit. I did have one evening run - guess I haven’t mentioned yet that my current occupation is as a chauffeur (long story behind that best saved for another time) - and sat down to check the website when I got home.

The website statistics haven’t been updating since Friday night, so I don’t know how many people have been visiting the site, but I know we’ve had visitors, because we’ve received several new signers to the petition and our first offer of a place to stay for a night along the way - thanks, Ronald!

And...I think we’ve had our first offer of a support vehicle. I say "I think" because I only received the second part of the message that was sent and it seemed to be talking about a bus that’s available. A bus?! Wow! That’s a fantastic offer - especially so soon. But as much as I would deeply appreciate such an offer - if that’s what it is - it would certainly be problematic. For one thing, we’re going to have to wait and see if we will be able to find enough financial support to allow Jonna to come along with me as I walk to D.C. - and for another, Jonna has already said that she wouldn’t feel comfortable driving anything much larger than our van. She also isn’t licensed to drive something huge.

Matter of fact, if by November we’re able to raise the kind of support we need to allow her to come along, it may wind up that our trusty, rusty ol’ van will be our support vehicle. True, it already has enough miles on it to have driven to the moon (quite literally) but what’s a few thousand more? At least we’d be together. And if we have to be apart for several months that will be the absolute worst thing about this whole adventure. The dogs would come long too, of course - Finn and Spoof. I haven’t bragged on Finn and Spoof yet - I’ll have to do that sometime soon.

September 2: Checking the statistics this morning, I see that we had 33 unique visitors to the website yesterday. That is outstanding! It means that, even though I haven’t yet heard back from many of the organizations we contacted with our official launch on Thursday night, many of them have at least taken a peek at the website - and that’s a start. If I don’t have to spend too much time at work today I hope we can send out our planned announcements to other organizations and individuals. We wanted to hit some of the local and major antiwar groups with the first announcement. The second group will be to a number of churches and to specific individuals we want to notify, such as select senators and members of Congress. Our thoughts right now are to wait a bit before notifying any news media, as I doubt that they’re going to be very interested until we get much closer to November first.

I realize my petition may seem a bit simplistic to some, but I would encourage people not to confuse simplistic with simple. Yes, it is a simple approach to ending these wars, bringing our sons and daughters home and restoring a sane balance of power within our government, but it is far from simplistic. After all the obfuscation, half truths and untruths that have been slung at us over the past few years I fear that many people are no longer capable of cutting through it all to get down to the basics of the situation - and that’s what my petition tries to do. When we cut through all the garbage and get right to the core elements, it is rather easy to understand that whatever we’re doing in the Middle East right now, we cannot accurately call it war. War has a fairly clear definition as it applies in the relationships of nations. Remember

Korea

, where a major barrier to clarity was the fact that we refused to call it a war? Now we’re calling just about everything we do a war of some sort or other, but by doing so we once again lose clarity on the issue. If we look at our actions in the Middle East from the perspective of an accurate, acceptable definition of what war is, it is fairly easy to see that whatever it is that we’re doing over there, it is not now war in terms of what war really means. And if that is the case, the whole house of cards collapses. If it isn’t war, then war powers must return to their normal distribution. If it isn’t war, then we cannot have our military deployed on foreign soil and conducting operations as if it was war.

But here’s the scary part. If the response to these realizations is going to be, "Well, if we can’t call it war under the historic definition of war, then let’s change the definition of war so that we can continue to do what we’re doing," - then we’re in for real trouble. The moment we change our definition and understanding of war to accommodate our present actions we will discover that we have quite literally embarked on a permanent war, limitless and unending. The "war" on terror - even as it is defined in the resolutions that ceded Congress’ war powers to the president - does not define a specific entity as the enemy. It does not define a specific goal that this "war" is to achieve. It does not speak to identifiable geographic boundaries, balances of power or distributions of authority. What it does do is permit the president, at will, to declare war on any given organization, group of people - or even an individual. Imagine that - the president can declare that the

United States

is at war with a specific individual! In addition, it gives the president authority to conduct military actions against any person anywhere and at any time. Is the group or individual residing in a friendly nation? No problem - under these resolutions the president is free to send our military forces wherever he wishes to fight whatever war he has declared, even if it is on the soil of another sovereign nation.

And the thing that makes it an endless war is that it’s a war against a concept, an idea, an abstract - a war against terror. The sad reality is that there is not a single soul alive who is not capable, in their darkest of hearts, of employing terror tactics when pushed hard enough and far enough. The capability to unleash terror is a frightening but intrinsic part of the human condition. So ultimately, the only way to "wipe out" terror (and you’ve heard that phrase used) is to annihilate all of humanity. If that realization doesn’t frighten you I don’t know what will.

If we allow the "war" on terror to be included in our accepted definition of what a war is, the president will obviously have the right to retain the war powers ceded to him indefinitely and in perpetuity. Our nation’s careful balance of powers ceases to exist, and the executive branch of our government can do quite literally anything it decides to do for no other reason that it has determined - in its sole discretion - that the organization, group or individual against which it chooses to act is capable of terrorist activities and therefore an enemy. In other words, by the simple step of considering terror to be an acceptable target against which to wage an actual war - and giving the president the authority to do so - we have instantly established the foundation of a totalitarian dictatorship to replace our democracy. This is not a reach at all. It’s already in place. Think about it. This is why it is crucial that our leadership revisits the fundamental concept of war, realizes that our efforts to combat terrorism should not and must not be permitted to be defined as a war, and immediately undoes the damage it has done by granting the executive branch the power to wage war against an idea. We are in the midst of perhaps the greatest crisis our nation has ever faced as we have set the stage for a complete dissolution of our democracy. I hope that my petition will help cut to the center of this crisis and correct it before so many of our rights and freedoms have been compromised that we will find none of our constitutional avenues of action are left to pursue.

September 1: We had planned to send out the first official announcements of our project today, but actually jumped the gun a bit and sent announcements to a number of organizations late last night. As a result, today has been a day of firsts. Our first direct response came from Gila Svirsky from the Coalition of Women for Peace. She said, "Good luck from the women’s peace movement in

Israel

, Bill!" It really made us feel wonderful - here we are, trying to make contacts in San Diego so that we can get things rolling, and our first official voice of encouragement comes from halfway around the world. Thank you, Gila - and right back atcha.

Our next first came from Dave Patterson from the San Diego Veterans for Peace. Dave wanted to know if I’d be willing to speak at their next meeting on Tuesday. Wild horses couldn’t keep me away, Dave! When I got home from work in the evening and checked the website email, I found we had received both our first webmail (from Steve Bisbikis, a

Vietnam

vet) and our very first cosigner of the petition via the website - Don Albares Jr., a U.S. Army veteran. Thank you, Steve and Don. I’ve not doubted for a moment that what we’re doing is the right thing at the right time, but it is certainly a wonderful feeling to have that conviction validated so quickly and enthusiastically by others. We’ve had two cosigners today. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if, by the time I arrive in Washington, we have two million? That would be a statement that our government would be hard pressed to ignore! Hey - I can dream, can’t I?

Wow - I had some really steamy rhetoric that I was just about to publish here, but at the very last minute decided - for now - to be valorous (as it relates to discretion) and save it for another time and place.

August 31: I’ve kept a loose journal of what has happened since the inception of this idea on August 18^th, but have decided it would be best to spare visitors the angst, trauma and drama of the past couple of weeks - and there certainly has been plenty of all of that. But tomorrow is the date we’ve set to officially launch this project in terms of letting the world at large know what we’re proposing to do, so it seemed like a good time to begin the journal as well.

We start with some wonderful good news. Our daughter Becky called this afternoon to tell us she may have found our very first sponsor. Nothing definite yet, but a business that may be willing to provide some needed electronics for the journey. Since Jonna and I have elected to approach this whole thing working on the assumption that we will wind up completely on our own and having to find a way to do this on our own almost nonexistent resources, it comes as a very welcome surprise to find someone interested in helping us - and before we’ve even officially launched! Whoever you are, you can’t imagine how much this has encouraged us, and we thank you in advance.

Tonight we’re still working on the format of tomorrow’s announcement and exactly what organizations and which people we’re going to send it to. Jonna, a classic technophobe if there ever was one, had been assuming that we’d print letters and send them out to various people. When I told her that I thought emails would be both more efficient and more effective she confessed that the thought had never even occurred to her.

We’ve decided that in this first announcement the best plan will probably be to make the message fairly short, referring people to the website to find our petition and the rationale behind it. We hope it won’t take too long to determine what sort of response that produces, then we’ll work from there on deciding how to further generate some attention for the project. Our hope, of course, is that we’ll find some folks who are interested in what we have to say and that I’ll soon be able to establish opportunities to speak to various groups and begin to create some momentum. While the journey and the opportunity to meet and talk with people along the way is the thing, I am going to be holding on to the hope that we just may have the potential to become a catalyst for something much larger than our own personal convictions.