My Evening with Al Gore and his Slide Show Presentation

by Linda*in*SFNM ~ 4th October 2007



As many of you know, last night was Rio Rancho's Al Gore Live Presentation with his slide show, "An Inconvenient Truth." Besides the important information about the Climate Crisis, our desire to show support for Mr. Gore to be our President was in full swing.

We arrived at the Santa Ana Star Center over an hour before the event was scheduled to start. Unfortunately the police said they were given orders no signs be on property. Given so many expected this to be "the place" to be, we had many other candidates, Presidential and Senate, present that were pushed to the sidelines as well. We stood on the sidewalk facing the entrance armed with buttons, fliers and displaying our banner. I don't know if Mr. Gore had a chance to see us, but the people sure did. It was great to hear-pretty much everyone wanting a Gore Presidency. Almost everyone we asked if they wanted a button was thrilled to put one on. Of course we weren't getting many walking by us, being we weren't in front of the door, so I sent Bruce with a bag of them to pass out in front of the entrance. He walked back within minutes that they were gone instantly 3 times.

The people were very excited about Gore for President. And the only one person who displayed skepticism that he would run and didn't want a button, came up to me after the presentation to say "I changed my mind, can I still have a button?" But people who were not even part of the "official Draft Gore" were still all on the same page and were doing their own individual part. It was so exciting. I had a couple with their daughter coming up with signs and petitions to join the Kyoto Treaty. And another couple inside painted R U N down their shirts. And yet another couple in front of us were too from Santa Fe and excited to hear there was a movement. And because the buttons we made have the website's address, www.algore.org on it, it is easy for them to officially get involved.

After arriving at our seats and realizing there was an opportunity to hit the folks up sitting in the front of the stage that Mr. Gore would be speaking on, I walked over to ask if anyone wanted buttons. If they weren't already wearing them (as we saw them on the chests everywhere we looked) more asked for them. Then the folks on the side that saw and heard I had buttons all started yelling out that they wanted some and I started getting "we need 5 over here." I had to excuse myself to return with them as I ran out. When I returned with more buttons, the people asked if they could shake my hand to thank me for my work, and one man yelled out "I love you."

Mr. Gore was absolutely incredible. He was so energetic, passionate, strong and funny. He opened up with some humor, before giving the facts. But he carefully alleviates the tension from the intense information he is sharing, with a slight break of humor every once in a while. The information and facts he shares, just rolls off effortlessly with intense passion being displayed when the news gets deep. The standing ovations he received when entering paled in comparison to when he finished his presentation. I don't think any of us wanted to sit down.

The information Mr. Gore shared in his presentation was updated with current information. So I must say how disturbing it was, after thinking I saw and heard the information before from the movie, to see and hear the latest news, including the fact that he highlighted information for our state. Most troubling was the fact that with everything happening, we are indeed running out of time. As he clearly stated, we are speeding up the warming at an alarming rate. We went from 100 years time to act, down to 50. Then after the long awaited study, it showed so much damage that we had as little as 34 years. Last month new information came out saying the rate is advancing so much with the melting of arctic ice, that we now had only 23 years before the tipping point. Well, after last weeks news that twice the size of England melted and then the size of Florida disappeared, Mr. Gore just received word the day prior that our tipping point may be as early as in 7 years. 7 years. I started to cry.

Mr. Gore said he believes we can solve this still, but we need to act with urgency and he is asking for citizenry activism. Get involved. Go online and find out what we can do to help. He also made clear that we must restore our democracy.

The evening ended when he was to take questions from the audience. At this point I figured if I got kicked out, it would have been worth it, so I took my banner, opened it up and dropped it hanging from our legs. I know it was seen, because Fran saw it sitting on the opposite side of the Center, and I noticed people in their seats pointing to the banner giving a "thumbs up." I can only hope a pause from Mr. Gore was him having a glimpse of it. Because, after all, it is time, Time for a COOL change with Mr. Gore.

The final questions of the evening were of a young girl and boy, ages 12 and 13. They both wanted to know if this would be solved, by whom and, "Do I and my children have a chance?" That pretty much said it all, what is on the mind of their generation. Then the little girl added "Good luck in winning the Nobel Peace Prize." Mr. Gore bowed his head with that and then responded that it is our responsibility to solve this for them and their children. And he hopes they will ask the question of how we managed to solve this. I do too.

Upon leaving from the very emotion filled presentation, I had the chance to find that little girl and give her a button. I hope that will help give some added hope that we will solve this crisis for her.

Thank you Al Gore.

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