This is how revolutions fail: Without a sound

Did I foresee this? Or did I hide it from my mind?

I don't know.

This is how most revolutions end, I suppose. In silence, behind closed doors. When there is no martyr to sacrifice, to adulterate. And this is how this one will end too, before it began. What did we want after all? Money? Would that satisfy? We knew, after all, that we could not escape the hourd of five year olds. But would money make them more bearable?

We imagined, and enjoyed imagining, that we had strength, that bound together we could get our way. Our will would be granted. We were delusional in our scheming. We said to each other "they must do something." But what never occured to us was that they didn't. They didn't have to do anything.

They called us in, one by one, to break us down. Brick by brick. Until we accepted their offer of nothing, and thanked them for not giving us worse. Katrina was first. I was second. David was thrid.

I did not get to speak to Katrina, before I entered. In the meeting room, a small circular room with three chairs and a glass table, I could not help but notice the way the artificial plant cast its shadow across the frosted glass window. An articifial tree casting a shadow from an artificial light onto artificial frosted glass. I could see the green of the leaf fading gently. It was a meaningless detail.

"This isn't what you really want," they said, "why did you sign this?"

It sounds trite. An elementary tactic. Test the very foundation of the structure.

But funny thing is, they were right. I didn't want that, though I wrote it. I suppose greed had led me to sign it. Greed and envy. I thought we would win. No struggle. They do need us more than we need them, after all. But, when it came down to it, I didn't really care. But didn't tell them that. For something else took over my body. Something that has to do with principles.

Something was set in motion. A letter, a signiture, a meeting, a demand. And it was these things that spoke for me now. Each argument built brick by brick upon the previous action. Two selves seperated. One bound by desire, one by principle. Each acting out of turn.

It was, after all, desire that got me into this mess. And now, just when desire turns and flees, principle steps in and says, "I signed this letter in the delusion of my desire, but I will stand by it in the sobriety of principle."

Foolishness.

Dictated by the principle of argument, the principle of battle, the principle of pride, the principle of brotherhood. I lost sight of what I wanted and acted as a figure head. In the guise of fulfilling my will, I abandoned my self to an ideal. I am my puppet self.

Even as I speak, I know I am already defeated. But I cannot surrender, for the ideal always struggles onward. We parry, my bosses and I, and arrive at a stalemate.

As I greet my fellow comrades in the teacher room, I realize that I alone hold this ideal. I alone am willing to waste my time arguing fruitlessly. Risk my job. Approach martyrdom.

In their eyes, defeat. Shame.

And I realized. That all that time. In the small circular room. I was not I. I was them. I was arguing for their sakes. I was unrelenting for their sakes. I would not back down because it was not I who was speaking. It was us.

For when I saw the defeat in their eyes, when I heard them confess defeat, I too was defeated.