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Vigil
Let me tell you a story.
As of October 25th, two thousand American soldiers have died in the war in Iraq, and more than ten times as many Iraqi citizens. MoveOn.org sent out a call for people to attend one of the candlelight vigils that their regional coordinators would be hosting in various places across the country on the evening of the 26th, between 6:30 and 7:00 pm.
I learned about the protest through an e-mail alert from TrueMajority, another social action coalition whose mailing list I had joined. I went to MoveOn's website to find the location of the vigil in Philadelphia. There were actually two, one at City Hall and one in Washington Square, at 7th and Locust.
Since I did not have any candles at home, I stopped at a drugstore en route to buy one. They didn't have any of the simple candlesticks I was looking for, so I had to settle for a chunky vanilla-scented candle. It was sort of silly, but it had the virtue of being less likely to drip hot wax on me.
I arrived much too early, as I have a habit of doing. So, for a lack of anything else to do, I bought a 20oz bottle of soda from a local deli and wandered around the park. Washington Square is a very fitting place for a vigil honoring the American soldiers who have died in this war - or a very ironic one. Beneath the park are buried hundreds of unidentified soldiers who died fighting the Revolutionary War more than two centuries ago. In the center of the park is a large fountain - turned off now because of the cold - and a short distance from there, down what would be Locust Street if the park hadn't interrupted it, is a monument. It is a granite dais, surrounded by a waist-high series of posts with chains through them and backed by a wall.
There are four things of note on the dais. The first is a gas-powered flame, front and center, fenced in by a wrought-iron guard. Behind that is a stone sarcophagus in which is interred the body of an unknown soldier who gave his life in the Revolutionary War. Standing over the sarcophagus is a bronze statue of George Washington on a pedestal. Behind him is the granite wall, about fifteen feet high, that backs the monument. On that wall, above Washington's head, is an inscription that reads, "Freedom is a light for which many have died in darkness."
I think there was something wrong with the gas flame, because it kept going out and coming back on again.
At the onset of dusk, people began to gather around the dais. Among the first there were the event's coordinators, Sherry and Jenny [1]. Sherry was a thin woman in her fifties or sixties with short grey hair. Jenny was around 30, with brown hair pulled back in a ponytail and rectangular glasses. I asked them how many people they were expecting: when I'd signed up on the website the day before, only five people had registered. They said the final count had been a little over a hundred.
Some of the other attendees had brought their own candles. Others candles that Sherry and Jenny had brought with them - candlesticks stuck through paper cups, or tealights in plastic ones. A little after 6:30, Sherry asked for our attention while she read out the names, ages and home states of some of the American soldiers who had died in Iraq.
While she read from the list, I looked around at the other people gathered for the vigil. Of the hundred who had registered, about half seemed to be in attendance. All of them were white and middle-class. There were some young-twentysomethings like myself there, but the majority of the gathering was old enough to have marched against the Vietnam war when they were about my age.
Many of the soldiers on Sherry's list had been about my age.
After Sherry finished reading off the names, we walked out to take a circuit around Washington Sqaure on the sidewalk outside the park's enclosing Colonial Wall. There was a strong wind, so my candle went out and someone else helped me relight it. I did the same for another person. A man in the park, talking on his cellphone, said that there were a thousand of us marching. Some of us laughed, and one person said, "yeah, we need more people to inflate the numbers like that."
There was a Comcast News van parked nearby, and a cameraman was scrambling here and there to get shots of us. I might show up in whatever news report they were filming for, but I won't be able to watch it because I don't have cable. There was also a reporter with a microphone who spoke about the event as we passed by her. She called it a protest: Sherry didn't seem to like that word, and wondered aloud whether she should interrupt the reporter and clarify that it was a vigil. Indeed, I thought, the whole event was too subdued to be called a protest.
As I was getting out of earshot of the reporter, I heard her say something about Vietnam.
We did not go all the way around the park: we went back to the monument to pick up a few latecomers who had gathered there in our absence. Jenny directed us to the Walnut Street side of the park, where we would be highly visible to all the passing traffic. We more or less completed our interrupted circuit, and returned to the monument just as the clock struck seven. Sherry thanked us for attending: Jenny asked if some people would be willing to stand along the wall parallel to Walnut Street for another twenty minutes or so. I joined the score of people who went with her. Most of those were in their 30s or younger.
While we stood along the wall, some passers-by asked us what our vigil was for. Jenny, or one of the others, answered "it's for the 2000 soldiers who died in Iraq." I realized that, aside from the reporter's remark, I had not heard the word "protest" from anyone.
After a quarter of an hour people began to blow out their candles and trickle away. I wanted to get home before it got too dark and cold, so I blew out my candle and carried it with me, unlit, as I headed east on Walnut Street. As I crossed 6th, a man asked me what the vigil was for. I almost said, to protest the war, but instead I answered, "Two thousand soldiers died in Iraq, and more than ten times as many Iraqis, so we're holding this vigil..." He thanked me for the information and walked on.
On the walk home, I had time to reflect on and regret my answer. Sherry and Jenny had made sure that the vigil would be about mourning, not anger - but shouldn't there have been at least a little anger, some unrest, some demand for change? I felt disappointed with the whole night. My bladder, with complete disregard for poliical concerns or personal angst, was feeling the effects of the soda I'd drunk earlier that night. So I went into a restaurant to use the bathroom, making sure I asked permission from one of the waitresses at the bar on the way.
When I came out, I was still carrying the scented, unlit candle I had brought to the vigil. A woman at the bar asked me why I was carrying it.
"I was protesting the war," I said, and walked out.
[1] I've actually forgotten her name, but I remembered that it had two consonants in the middle and ended with a y, like Sherry's.
As of October 25th, two thousand American soldiers have died in the war in Iraq, and more than ten times as many Iraqi citizens. MoveOn.org sent out a call for people to attend one of the candlelight vigils that their regional coordinators would be hosting in various places across the country on the evening of the 26th, between 6:30 and 7:00 pm.
I learned about the protest through an e-mail alert from TrueMajority, another social action coalition whose mailing list I had joined. I went to MoveOn's website to find the location of the vigil in Philadelphia. There were actually two, one at City Hall and one in Washington Square, at 7th and Locust.
Since I did not have any candles at home, I stopped at a drugstore en route to buy one. They didn't have any of the simple candlesticks I was looking for, so I had to settle for a chunky vanilla-scented candle. It was sort of silly, but it had the virtue of being less likely to drip hot wax on me.
I arrived much too early, as I have a habit of doing. So, for a lack of anything else to do, I bought a 20oz bottle of soda from a local deli and wandered around the park. Washington Square is a very fitting place for a vigil honoring the American soldiers who have died in this war - or a very ironic one. Beneath the park are buried hundreds of unidentified soldiers who died fighting the Revolutionary War more than two centuries ago. In the center of the park is a large fountain - turned off now because of the cold - and a short distance from there, down what would be Locust Street if the park hadn't interrupted it, is a monument. It is a granite dais, surrounded by a waist-high series of posts with chains through them and backed by a wall.
There are four things of note on the dais. The first is a gas-powered flame, front and center, fenced in by a wrought-iron guard. Behind that is a stone sarcophagus in which is interred the body of an unknown soldier who gave his life in the Revolutionary War. Standing over the sarcophagus is a bronze statue of George Washington on a pedestal. Behind him is the granite wall, about fifteen feet high, that backs the monument. On that wall, above Washington's head, is an inscription that reads, "Freedom is a light for which many have died in darkness."
I think there was something wrong with the gas flame, because it kept going out and coming back on again.
At the onset of dusk, people began to gather around the dais. Among the first there were the event's coordinators, Sherry and Jenny [1]. Sherry was a thin woman in her fifties or sixties with short grey hair. Jenny was around 30, with brown hair pulled back in a ponytail and rectangular glasses. I asked them how many people they were expecting: when I'd signed up on the website the day before, only five people had registered. They said the final count had been a little over a hundred.
Some of the other attendees had brought their own candles. Others candles that Sherry and Jenny had brought with them - candlesticks stuck through paper cups, or tealights in plastic ones. A little after 6:30, Sherry asked for our attention while she read out the names, ages and home states of some of the American soldiers who had died in Iraq.
While she read from the list, I looked around at the other people gathered for the vigil. Of the hundred who had registered, about half seemed to be in attendance. All of them were white and middle-class. There were some young-twentysomethings like myself there, but the majority of the gathering was old enough to have marched against the Vietnam war when they were about my age.
Many of the soldiers on Sherry's list had been about my age.
After Sherry finished reading off the names, we walked out to take a circuit around Washington Sqaure on the sidewalk outside the park's enclosing Colonial Wall. There was a strong wind, so my candle went out and someone else helped me relight it. I did the same for another person. A man in the park, talking on his cellphone, said that there were a thousand of us marching. Some of us laughed, and one person said, "yeah, we need more people to inflate the numbers like that."
There was a Comcast News van parked nearby, and a cameraman was scrambling here and there to get shots of us. I might show up in whatever news report they were filming for, but I won't be able to watch it because I don't have cable. There was also a reporter with a microphone who spoke about the event as we passed by her. She called it a protest: Sherry didn't seem to like that word, and wondered aloud whether she should interrupt the reporter and clarify that it was a vigil. Indeed, I thought, the whole event was too subdued to be called a protest.
As I was getting out of earshot of the reporter, I heard her say something about Vietnam.
We did not go all the way around the park: we went back to the monument to pick up a few latecomers who had gathered there in our absence. Jenny directed us to the Walnut Street side of the park, where we would be highly visible to all the passing traffic. We more or less completed our interrupted circuit, and returned to the monument just as the clock struck seven. Sherry thanked us for attending: Jenny asked if some people would be willing to stand along the wall parallel to Walnut Street for another twenty minutes or so. I joined the score of people who went with her. Most of those were in their 30s or younger.
While we stood along the wall, some passers-by asked us what our vigil was for. Jenny, or one of the others, answered "it's for the 2000 soldiers who died in Iraq." I realized that, aside from the reporter's remark, I had not heard the word "protest" from anyone.
After a quarter of an hour people began to blow out their candles and trickle away. I wanted to get home before it got too dark and cold, so I blew out my candle and carried it with me, unlit, as I headed east on Walnut Street. As I crossed 6th, a man asked me what the vigil was for. I almost said, to protest the war, but instead I answered, "Two thousand soldiers died in Iraq, and more than ten times as many Iraqis, so we're holding this vigil..." He thanked me for the information and walked on.
On the walk home, I had time to reflect on and regret my answer. Sherry and Jenny had made sure that the vigil would be about mourning, not anger - but shouldn't there have been at least a little anger, some unrest, some demand for change? I felt disappointed with the whole night. My bladder, with complete disregard for poliical concerns or personal angst, was feeling the effects of the soda I'd drunk earlier that night. So I went into a restaurant to use the bathroom, making sure I asked permission from one of the waitresses at the bar on the way.
When I came out, I was still carrying the scented, unlit candle I had brought to the vigil. A woman at the bar asked me why I was carrying it.
"I was protesting the war," I said, and walked out.
[1] I've actually forgotten her name, but I remembered that it had two consonants in the middle and ended with a y, like Sherry's.