We walked for what felt like days before there was a difference in the landscape. The beam of Dr. Michael Dean"s miniature penlight illuminated some small slopes and what looked like burnt twigs and branches that clung to my pants and scratched my arms. To complete the misery, I had nothing but the green blouse to protect me from the frigidity of the land. And ah, let"s not forget the killing sores on my feet from the unending walking, scrubbing raw with every step I took.
And of course, I was so thirsty and hungry my stomach gurgled pitifully in protest every other minute.
As we covered more and more ground, we began seeing dead branches and dead trees with more frequency, until we entered what seemed to me like a forest of dead trees.
I wondered what happened to this land. The silence
