Dear Friends, Here in the Ferguson area, post-Grand Jury announcement, we are waking up, if we went to sleep at all, to a very gray day after a very sad, fire-lit night, to the continuing whirl of the helicopter which started before the announcement. Some clergy are marching to shut down Clayton. Some are leading vigils. Some are starting to clean up Ferguson and other places. Some are working to keep safe places open and provide food and study places for children out of school. Last night we watched on TV the looting and burning of Ferguson and Dellwood and other places. We could see two of the fires from our house while smoke spiraled upward and whitened the night sky and blanketed the cold earth with ashen manna. Now the National Guard is on the scene. Too little, too late, too many questions, too much anger, too much destruction, too much division, too many hearts broken and weeping, too many of the same century's long issues ahead of us to address as a community and nation, too much healing needed. But also, too many people working for justice, too many souls not giving up. The phoenix is shaking the ashes off its feathers and eventually will rise. Ellie Stock elliestock@aol.com