The littlest ones were the most excited… the day had finally arrived! The day they had been waiting for… the day when the world would change. And there was going to be a big party – with fireworks and candy and everything. Although most of them had never even been to a funeral, let alone participated in a funeral procession… they were taking the event as seriously as their young years would allow.
From the moment each of them woke up early that grey Thursday morning, from the first tug of the first leg of the new uniforms they have been given… they had each felt as though they were going to burst with pride…. Even though they were just little, soon they were going to be in charge. No more bedtimes or homework or eating food that only a grown up could like. In the midst of their joyous daydreaming, the children - some as young as five or six - unconsciously patted their thighs reassuring themselves that the big gun was where it was supposed to be.
Lydia watched the children jostle each other in the funeral procession as they all followed the shiny mahogany coffin, draped with seemingly endless yards of black silk made its way down Main Street. Lydia’s mind was filled with vivid images of this same vignette playing out in every town, village and city across the nation… and if Teacher was right, maybe even around the whole world.
Teacher said a glorious new era was dawning and with every rebirth death must dawn first. Teacher said that with a rebirth this momentous, there might have to be a lot of death first.
They had practiced and practiced in the days leading up to this sacred day. Everything would be ticking along normally… the grade 1s practicing their letters… the grade 3s sweating over fractions… the grade 7s… well sometimes some of the grade 7s would just keep reading those battered old copies of To Kill a Mockingbird when the whistle blared over the P.A. system. A noise so loud that it made Jimmy Baker in Junior Kindergarten cover his ears and scream with pain… and yet some of the older kids couldn’t even hear it. Only children and dogs could hear the frequency emitted by that whistle. The perfect invisible call to arms. It made Lydia want to cry watching some of those High School kids look around, wondering what was going on. Teacher said that decades before some people had tried to change the world by not trusting anyone over 30. More like 13, Teacher said.
Lydia… only twelve and a half, but already she couldn’t always hear the whistle when it commanded the children to attention.
There were two worlds forming on Main Street. One was calm, peaceful and arranged in straight lines according to age. The other world swirling around it was infected with terror and chaos, fear and desperation. Some older children started running - toward their homes where parents and older siblings were hiding in basements and closets… and each time one ran, a younger child would move from his or her statue still pose, move one step out of the line, point at the adolescent and shout “Death before Rebirth”. And a sniper would shoot the runner in the back of the head.
A sixty-something women ascended the dais and cleared her throat as she reached for the mic. “We are the church of the Baby Jesus… the followers of the infant Moses… the acolytes of the young Buddha… we honor the holy temple of all that is youthful and beautiful.” The Teacher motioned to a handful of 10 year old boys on her left. “Bring the coffin here and open it,” she commanded.
“Everything that is good and true and wise ends in Adulthood… it is adults who have contaminated this planet and persecuted her people. It is us so-called grown ups who have hijacked any possible future for this world… for generations have consumed the world as though it is their private
The Baby Boomers, the gen xers, the Y’s the Millenials… we each had our chance to do good and instead we treated the world like our own private Disneyland.”
“But no more… Adulthood has come to an end and with that end the new beginning for all creation.” A line was forming in front of the open, empty casket. “And this new beginning is all thanks to you… Your courage, your dedication and your willingness to sacrifice those you love has made the New World possible.” Cheering rang out amongst the young crowd, but Lydia could see that there were also a lot of red eyes and even some tears flowing down smooth cheeks.
“So let us bury the past. Bring your mementos and put them in the coffin. The children shuffled ceremoniously toward the casket and one by one dropped in trophies of the morning’s revolutionary activity: blood soaked ties, family photographs crumpled by clenched fists
Six somber dark suited men and women slowly lower the coffin into a hole wide and deep enough to hold hundreds of caskets.
All at once virtually all of the children leave the funeral procession and move toward something – or someone – not visible, or audible to the others. Like the children following the Pied Piper these ones move quickly, quietly
The littlest were the most excited…. The most sad… the most precious… to the New Order.
Teacher nodded approvingly as the last child deposited a family photo album with a bullet hole burned through the middle. “Thank you for clearing the way for the era of the youth. Only I will stay on to advise… you are now in charge… but I will help you govern.”
Lydia knew it was only time before she wouldn’t be able to hear the dog whistle at all. But Teacher had explained that if the planet was to survive there could be no exceptions to the rule. If you can’t hear the whistle, you can’t be part of the revolution. No Exceptions Lydia whispered as she raised her gun and proving that practice makes perfect, shot Teacher right between the eyes.
