New Year Message from Sarah!

[Free the Hikers]

Dear Friends and Supporters,

I will spend the first weeks of 2011 struggling for Josh and Shane's
freedom on the East Coast with renewed fortitude. I've been busy doing
research and outreach for the last two weeks, first from my temporary
home with good friends in Oakland, Ca and then from my sweet sister's
home in Athens, Georgia surrounded by family.

It's done me a lot of good after 3 months of almost non-stop action to
take the time to draw from my deepest reserves and continue to thaw-
out. I feel better prepared to start the New Year with optimism,
clarity and faith that the highest good will guide us to the end of
this ordeal.

Every step away from prison is a step away from something wrong
towards something right. The longer I am free without Shane and Josh
the more clear it becomes to me how unnatural and dehumanizing it is
to try and lock up the human soul. It's difficult to justify harsh
punishment even when a person has done something terribly wrong; it's
unconscionable when they haven't.

"We live in a world where there is considerable suffering; we cannot
always prevent it, but we can alleviate it, and we can try to turn it
around." TERRY WAITE

My hope is that I never hear another supporter of Shane, Josh or
myself say that they "haven't done enough." Everyday is a little bit
lighter for Shane, Josh, and all of us on the front lines of this
particular tragedy, because we know that we are never alone. Everyday
of what felt like an interminable stretch of days in prison was
bearable simply because of that fact.

The cards, banners, donations, altars, pictures, poems, songs, vigils,
events, press releases, research, introductions, phone calls, writing,
thinking, organizing, planning, interviewing, listening, contacting,
comments, emails, prayers, shawls, couches, omelets, smiles, hot
dishes, tears, days, hours and months of support that you've all
offered have made a difference from the very first minute and will
until the last.

Almost a year and a half of Shane and Josh's lives have been taken
from them, the first year of which we only saw the world outside
prison walls 4 times. I used to picture a path in my mind leading out
of prison. There were lanterns hung alongside the path up to a certain
point and where the lanterns ended there was only darkness.

Let's bring in the light. As the saying goes, "All good things come
in threes."

Thank you,
Sarah

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