Susiej

There are times when silence has the loudest voice, Leroy Brownlow.

On Mother’s Day, May 13, 2007, women will stand for five minutes of silence at 1 p.m. your local time, in parks, schoolyards, churches and backyards. Learn more, here;

• If you want to express your desire for peace in the world…
• If you want to express your concern that our country continues to wage war in foreign lands…
• If you want to show your community and your government where you stand….
• If you want to gather with like-minded individuals in a spirit of love and harmony…

Mother’s Day was actually created to raise awareness of poor health conditions. Several years later, in 1905 the author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, Julia Ward Howe, organized a day encouraging mothers to rally for peace, “since she believed they bore the loss of human life more harshly than anyone else in her community. ”

The movement for Five Minutes of Silence has a Standing Woman Story, from their website.

Sharon Mehdi wrote a wonderful short story for her five-year old granddaughter, The Great Silent Grandmother Gathering that has inspired us. A quick summary of the story is:
A busboy who worked in a café whose window faced the public park noticed that two grandmotherly looking women had been standing in the park all day without moving at all and without talking. They were dressed up in their Sunday best and were just staring at the town hall. He asked the other patrons in the café what they thought the women were up to. They speculated on a variety of things. Then, a five-year old year who was in the café spoke up and said “One of them is my grandmother and I know what they are doing. They are standing there to save the world.” All of the men in the café hooted and howled and laughed. On his way home the busboy decided to ask the women what they were doing and sure enough their answer was “We are saving the world.”
Over dinner that evening the busboy told his parents and he and his father hooted and howled, but his mother was totally silent. After dinner, the mother called her best friends to tell them.
The next morning the busboy looked out the café window and the two women were back, along with his mother, her friends, and the women who had been in the café the day before. All were standing in silence staring at the town hall. Again, the men hooted and howled and said things like “You can’t save the world by standing in the park. That is what we have armies for,” and “everyone knows you have to have banners and slogans to save the world–you can’t do it by just standing in the park.”
The next day the women were joined by the women who were in the café the day before and a number of their friends. This brought the local newspaper reporter to the scene. He wrote a derisive article about the women. The day after it appeared, hundreds of women showed up to stand in the park in silence. The mayor then told the police chief to make the women leave because they were making the town appear to be foolish. When the police chief told them they would have to disperse because they didn’t have a permit, one of them responded that “we are just individuals standing in our public park and we are not giving speeches or having a demonstration so why would we need a permit.” The police chief thought about this and agreed with them and left the park.
At this point 2,223 women including the mayor’s wife, the police chief’s wife, and one five-year old girl were standing in the park to save the world. The news quickly spread and soon women were standing all over the country. The story ended with women standing in every country throughout the globe, standing to save the world.

So, put away your bellydance costume for 5 minutes, and stand for peace at 1:00 p.m. As for me, I will be standing on the sidelines at my son’s soccer game, with the other Mothers, in peace.
Spread the word.

StandingWomen Blog, here.

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