Knowing that ASARCO El Paso deliberately burned toxic-waste for profit is a terrible thing to realize. Years ago someone told me, when we suspected it - "We can't let the City know." And then she and another lady moved their families out of here ... "job changes"... most families raise their children to send them out of state to work somewhere else.
I look at the children whom I know, or the students I taught -- many sick. They can't pick up and move away. They can't work full-time and live their lives yet. They are children, and have their lives to live.
We can face it and gradually remove the poisons that economically will enslave them; or we can chose not to: that is our choice. And whichever choice we take requires a sacrifice.
"Merciful Father, I have squandered my days with plans of many things. This was not among them.....
For all we ought to have thought and have not thought;
All we ought to have said and have not said;
All we ought to have done and have not done:
I pray thee, God, for forgiveness.
—Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan, in the film The 13th Warrior (1999)"
