will PEACE!

"We must be the change we wish to see in the world." - Ghandi

Will Covert, peace activist

I left my job and sold my home to work for peace and to restore America's moral position. I hope you will join me in taking both small and large steps for peace that fit in your life. I invite you to participate in the peace forum.

I have once again answered the call of my country and have dedicated myself to

• Use non-violence to promote democracy and peace
• Help my fellow Americans understand the costs of war
• Work to protect our Constitutional rights
• And state promoting freedom of worship for all
• Support veterans

Letter from the peace front

The St. Louis, Cemetery, Washington, DC, Buffalo Trip
June 27th to July 27th, 2006

After nine days of R&R in Missouri it was time to once again hit the road.

St. Louis, Missouri
June 27th to 29th, 2006

I then drove up to my good friend Mahrya's (pronounced as in "They Call the Wind Mahrya" but is spelled differently then in the song) home in St. Louis. She is a kind soul with an insatiable passion to rid the world of racism. I am so very glad we are both on the same side. I much prefer having her as my friend and ally then as an opponent. I was hoping to visit with several of my friends from the area who were a part of the NYC11 group who drove to NYC for the April 29th march for Peace, Justice and Democracy in Manhattan. I did manage to see Len, Chris and Dennis at the march and got to spend an evening with Carlos and friends watching, of all things, one of my favorite classic comedy movies, "Young Frankenstein".

I was in St. Louis to express my displeasure to our president regarding the state of our economy, his all too belligerent foreign policy and his general mismanagement of the affairs of my country. But George was much to busy to acknowledge my and the 300 or so other unhappy citizens disapproval. He was attending a $2,000.00 a plate dinner to raise funds for his good friend Jim Talent’s reelection campaign. While out side, "We the people…" chanted for higher wages and an end to an illegal and unjust war of aggression. All I could think of that afternoon were the contemptuous words attributed to Marie Antoinette uttered when informed that her subjects did not have bread (food) to eat sometime before she and her husbands were beheaded for crimes against the people, “Let them eat cake!”

The Cemetery
4:00 to 7:00 PM
June 29th, 2006

On my way to Washington, DC from St. Louis along Interstate 64 I realized I would be passing through Clark County in the most south-easterly part of Indiana. From previous genealogical research I had done I remembered that my great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather, Daniel Covert, had relocated to that area of Indiana from, Monmouth, New Jersey in 1795. Daniel was a Revolutionary War Veteran and the largest battle of the Revolutionary War, the Battle of Monmouth, had been fought on his farm. I also remembered that he had been buried in a very old cemetery in Oregon Township.

I spent the better part of that afternoon tracking down the cemetery. And with the assistance of a couple of farmers and the staff of a local sub shop I was able to find the exact cemetery. It was in back of an abandoned Presbyterian Church near or in the town of New Market in Oregon Township, Clark County, Indiana. I had found, the graveyard where Daniel Covert had been buried. And I had also found the graves of numerous other Coverts whose tombstones indicated that they were born in the 1700's or 1800's and died in the 1800 or early 1900's. I didn't find Daniel's particular headstone as many of the older stone are crave into river stone which, as my research had predicted, would be heavily worn and difficult to read.

While I was there I took a few moments and sat on the stone wall nearest the graves of my ancestors and I attempted to chat with Daniel and my other ancestors. It was an incredibly gorgeous day and the weather was beautiful. I had many questions and so I queried Daniel concerning the two most pertinent for me: Why, almost 20 years after the beginning of the Revolutionary War did he see fit to pack up and move his family to what must have still been the wild frontier? And secondly, after having served in the Continental Army of the United States of America would he ever want to do just a thing again? I mean, did it even occur to him that he and his family would be repeating this same scenario, war after war, over and over again down to the present day?

And of course there were no booming-voice answers coming down from on high. I guess that's only in movies or fairy tails. No, I had to figure out my answers for myself. But I guess the real question for me that day was not, "Would you want to do the same thing over and over" but: "Are peace, love and caring a viable alternative to hate, fear and murder?" Interesting, isn't it. If Daniel and I were to have both answered in the affirmative, a resounding "Yes" then we would most probably find ourselves in whole new universe. The universe of, what does it mean to really live in peace? And are we, as human beings, capable of living in peace with one another?

Large questions to set aside for future rumination. It was now dusk and I had to hurry on in my travels as this was an unplanned stop and no time had been budgeted for the stop to begin with.

[My note just before posting this email: As it turned out, on my return trip I discovered that although there were many Covert graves in this particular cemetery and a couple of Covert graves in the New Market Christian Church Cemetery across the road neither one was the cemetery which Daniel had been buried in back in 1803. There will be more on this topic in the next edition of Letters from the Peace Front.]

Washington. DC
Code Pink: Troops Home Fast
July 3rd to July 5th, 2006

My next stop was in Washington, DC and Code Pink's "Troops Home Fast" hunger strike. Some have criticized the hunger strike as a sophomoric act. I say that if your heart is in the right place and your intent is to end the war and restore sanity to our planet then any nonviolent act is a justifiable and worthwhile statement of opposition and resistance to war. Don't stop Code Pink.

The fast continues until September 21 and your invited to join in fasting in whatever way you feel you are able. Memphis Mike is doing without sugar in his fast, others are fasting one day a week and still others are giving up meat during the fast. For further information:

http://www.codepink4peace.org/

and

http://www.troopshomefast.org/

Once again I stayed at Moya's lovely home in Falls Church, Virginia with Memphis Mike and his son Conner who had driven in from Memphis.

It too was another truly magical time in my journey from the opening ceremony under the statue of Gandhi,

to the last supper banquet before beginning the fast in front of the White House, to the Cindy Sheehan’s birthday celebration at the Busboys and Poets Club,

to the celebration and beginning of the fast on the 4th of July

and my subsequent departure for Buffalo, New York on the 5th of July. I said my goodbyes on that Friday morning and headed for Buffalo which brings us pretty much up to speed as I am writing form my room at the Honu Bed and Breakfast at St. James Place and Elmwood Avenue in Buffalo, New York.

From the front lines in peace I am,

Will Covert

P. S. And while I'm at it, if any of you can lend any expertise to building and maintain my website please contact me at will@willpeace.

to be continued . . .