Alternative to Mid Life Crisis: Find Your Voice Inspired by the Dreams of Others and Muses

Some comfortably well off empty nester baby boomers may obtain the car of their dreams or have an affair as the means to inspire passion.

This born and bred New Yorker, who moved to Florida before Mickey Mouse arrived, and whose sanctuary for the last ten years is upon ten acres in the Green Swamp [environmentally protected areas atop aquifers] of Central Florida, did something else instead.

A 1954 baby, born in Greenwich Village who got to grow up free to roam in Levittown when kids left the house after two bowls of Capt'n Crunch and as long as they returned home before the sun went down, nobody worried.

My childhood dream of growing up to be Brenda Starr, morphed into an adult desire to be a Dorothy Day-the 20th socialist anarchist Roman Catholic who challenged church, state and corporate media - for the 21st century.

Inspired by many muses I crossed paths with during my first of five trips to Israel Palestine in June 2005, on July 22, 2005, WAWA was born.

WAWA/WeAreWideAwake is a Pro-Bono/FREE Public Service to America. As a civilian journalist who has journeyed five times into Israel Palestine since June 2005, WAWA is dedicated to confronting media and governments that shield the whole truth. We who are wide awake are compelled by the "fierce urgency of Now"[Rev MLK, Jr.] to raise awareness and promote the human dialogue about many of the crucial issues of our day: the state of our Union and in protection of democracy, what life is like for Christians in Israel Palestine in the 21st Century, nuclear weapons, the environment, science, medicine, theology and spirituality.

Being inspired by the events of 9/11 to find out WHY did a few-back then it was a few-people in the world hated America so much to target and murder innocent ones-I began to research for answers to questions the media was not asking.

Hate that can kill any other, is a deep hate indeed, and I wanted to understand what fueled it. All roads led me to Jerusalem and the troubled bit of real estate we call the Holy Land, which in reality is in pieces; Bantustans.

Inspired by my faith as a Christian of the Beatitudes [meaning my manifesto is the Sermon on The Mount+] I wanted to do something positive, and was led to connect with a local interfaith non-political non-profit organization in 2003, the newly founded Olive Trees Foundation for Peace/OTFFP.

The OTFFP was envisioned by an American Palestinian and '48 refugee from the upper Galilee who made his way to the USA and realized the American dream.

After a lucrative career with Top Secret Clearance in the Defense Industry during the Cold War and THAT DAY we call 9/11, Dr. Khaled Diab's dream of helping his homeland by going PRO was born.

PRO seeks Peace and Reconciliation by providing Opportunities for all.

The OTFFP PRO dream came into reality when a few committed American Jews, Christians and Muslims got together in Orlando, Fl. and established the 501 3-c Olive Trees Foundation for Peace five years ago. http://www.olivetreesfoundation.org/

Inspired by my seven months of Tuesday afternoons listening to the memories of Dr. Diab's life, I wrote my first historical fiction, KEEP HOPE ALIVE with all proceeds going to help realize the OTFFP dream of blanketing the Holy Land with one million trees on both sides of The Wall.

Inspired by a photograph of a little boy of Bethlehem, published first in the Florida Catholic in 2001, and the desire to meet him, I traveled out of the states for the first time along with the first USA OTFFP delegation to Israel Palestine in June 2005. It is that photo of George of Beit Jala, a five minute car ride from the Church of The Nativity in downtown Bethlehem, occupied territory that adorns the WAWA banner.

Inspired by the fact that George's sanctuary was destroyed the night before his photo was taken and the shrapnel was imprinted: MADE IN USA, I vowed I would devote the rest of my life to doing something to help end the occupation and terror little children endure because of adults who choose violence.

Inspired by my meetings with the OTFFP's 'boots on the ground' who disseminated the now over 41,000 trees which are deeply rooted at houses of worship, schools and on private property of the neediest of land owners, I journeyed back solo four more times.

Inspired by the growing numbers of nonviolent Palestinians, Israelis and internationals who engage in nonviolent acts of civil disobedience in protest of the route of The Wall and 40+ years of military occupation, I published Memoirs of a Nice Irish American 'Girl's' Life in Occupied Territory which is dedicated to the Palestinian Christians with hope that their Exodus will soon cease and the land we call holy will be whole indeed.

Inspired by the dream that Reverend Martin Luther King had just days before his assassination when he saw "Israel as one of the greatest outposts of democracy in the world" and as an act of nonviolent civil disobedience, I am holding onto that dream by emailing, phoning and streaming video of Mordechai Vanunu, the whistle blower of Israel's WMD Program, who has been forbidden to speak to any foreigners ever since his 2004 release from 18 years in jail [most all in solitary] for telling the world that Israel was already nuclear in 1985.

Vanunu's freedom of speech trial began in January 2006 for speaking to foreign media in 2004 and concludes July 8, 2008 in Jerusalem. Israel could put Vanunu back behind bars for six more months, or be inspired to accept the Norwegians offer of asylum http://www.vanunu.org/ for him.


Inspired by the lack of spiritual depth and disappointing ending of The Da Vinci Code, KEEP HOPE ALIVE begins with the Nag Hamadi Library and the stages of the soul and ends with a howling wind to USA Christians to wake up to the heretical theology and neo-con ideology, of the Left Behind series.

Inspired by Gilda Radner/ Baba Wawa, George Harrison's opening number at the Concert for Bangladesh/ Wah Wah, the Arabic for a boo-boo/wawa and nonviolent internationals, Israelis and Palestinians who are wide awake and see the way to peace is justice and the way to justice is equal human rights and international law, WAWA: WeAreWideAwake.org is a labor of love in that cause.

Inspired by my intimate relationship with Jesus, who was never a Christian, but a social, justice, radical revolutionary Palestinian devout Jewish road warrior who rose up against the corrupt Temple authorities and challenged their job security by teaching the people they did NOT need to pay the priests for ritual baths or sacrificing livestock to be OK with God; for God LOVED them just as they were: sinners, poor, diseased, outcasts, widows, orphans, refugees and prisoners all living under Roman Military Occupation, I offer a new spin on Jesus in KEEP HOPE ALIVE.

Might you be inspired by the fact that 2,000 years ago The Cross had NO symbolic religious meaning. When JC said: "Pick up your cross and follow me" everyone understood he was issuing a POLITICAL statement, for the main roads in Jerusalem were lined with crucified agitators, rebels, dissidents and any who disturbed the status quo of the Roman Occupying Forces.

The Beatitudes for the 21st century:

About 2,000 years ago, when Christ was about 33, he hiked up a hill and sat down under an olive tree and began to teach the people;

"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven."

In other words: it is those who know their own spiritual poverty, their own limitations and sins honestly and trust God loves them in spite of themselves who already live in the Kingdom of God.
How comforted we will all be, when we see, we haven't got a clue, as to the depth and breadth of pure love and mercy of The Divine Mystery of The Universe. God's name in ancient Aramaic is Abba which means Daddy as much as Mommy and He/She: The Lord has said, "My ways are not your ways. My thoughts are not yours." -Isaiah 55:8


Christ proclaimed more: "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."

The essence of meek is to be patient with ignorance, slow to anger and never hold a grudge. In other words: how happy you will be when you also know humility; when you know yourself, the good and the bad, for both cut through every human heart.


"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, they will be filled."

In other words: how happy you will be when your greatest desire is to do what "God requires, and he has already told you what that is; BE JUST, BE MERCIFUL and walk humbly with your Lord."-Micah 6:8


"Blessed are the merciful, they will be shown mercy." In other words: how happy you will all be when you choose to return only kindness to your 'enemy.'


"For with the measure you measure against another, it will be measured back to you." Christ warns his disciples as he explains the law of karma in Luke 6:27-38.


"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they see God."


In other words: how happy you will be when you WAKE UP and see God is already within you, within every man, every woman and every child. The Supreme Being is everywhere, the Alpha and Omega, beginning and end. Beyond The Universe -and yet so small; within the heart of every atom.


"Blessed are The Peacemakers: THEY shall be called the children of God."


Oh how happy the WORLD will be when we all seek justice and pursue it, for there can be none without the other.

"Blessed are those who are persecuted because they do what God requires, theirs is The Kingdom of Heaven."

And one fine day the lion will lie down with The Lamb and man will make war no more and that is the Kingdom of God.