It's Sunday evening, 10.17 pm, Sydney time. As I sit here at my computer I seem a world away from the tragedy that is Kashmir, as reported in our papers tonight. 30,000 dead, as an estimate, with thousands more suffering probably horrendous injuries, and thousands upon thousands homeless. It's hard to imagine what it must be like for those people. For those mothers and fathers who saw their children off to school and now know they have all died in those schools, what comfort can anyone offer them? As a mother my one fear always was that something would happen to one of my children, or to me, when we were not together. I couldn't have faced that.

I extend my most heartfelt feelings of sadness to the people of those countries affected by this latest world disaster. I know it means little, nothing really to anyone, but it's all I can do. Sitting here in the relative safety of my own life, I have no measure of what it must be like for those people and I thank whoever that I am safe here. The sadness and grief that must be overwhelming those countries is more than I can fathom.

I won't accept that it's an act of someone's God. I am more inclined to wonder at what men are doing to this world of ours. How many nucleur devices have been allowed to be tested both in the atmosphere, and underground, and in how many regions of this world? How can anyone say that these actions are safe and will cause no harm or damage to the earth? Are we all so intellectually lacking that we believe that?

Perhaps it's time for people power to start a wave of revolt against the powers to be who wreak this havoc on our earth. Perhaps it's time that we began to say, "enough is enough, it's time to stop testing devices that you say will never be used". If there is no intention that they ever be used then why do they need to be tested? Maybe it's time to stop being complacent and accepting, and get back to standing up to be counted, as they did in the 60's.

When are the peoples of the world going to realise that there is only so much the earth can stand before it starts to show strain from abuse. It's no different to anything else that exists; stress will eventually break it down and perhaps that's why all these disasters are occurring now; it's simply had all it can take and is cracking under the strain.

I'm no scientist, I'm not even particularly academic or highly intelligent, but I don't think it takes too many brain cells to know that something isn't right and that it's probably a man made illness that our earth is suffering from.

It's too late for the people of Kashmir and for the other countries affected by this disaster, but perhaps it's not too late to stop killing our earth, this beautiful place where we all live. Just look around at the sky, the land, our sun as it rises and sets, cloud formations, the sea, the animals, the people even, and see the beauty. Imagine all that gone. It may well happen and it will no doubt be the fault of man; note I have deleted the human part of man as there is little that is humane about a lot of the people of this earth.

As always, these are my thoughts alone.

Vena