Alice Harken looked out the darkened windows of the Humvee as the fields fell slowly by. It was December 15, but by the looks of it, you would think it was October. On both sides of the highway, millet and sorghum was being harvested by combines as they plowed side by side up the hills cutting down the unseasonable crop. The low-water grains had pretty much replaced the regular winter wheat planted in the region. With trucks waiting in the field, they emptied the grain through their hoppers, creating clouds of orange dust that mixed with the already scorched looking atmosphere. The sun blazed through the afternoon sky and all Alice could do was shake her head.

In the Inland Northwest, farmers weren't exactly doing that great. With the ever so slight increase in the earth's temperature over the last decade, most had been forced to change what crops they were growing. In addition to the drought tolerant grains, they also had taken up artichokes and broccoli as the California drought had only deepened since the turn of the century.

Much of California had moved to the northern regions of the U.S. and some into Canada. Although people flock to the tropics on vacation, when you're not sitting on a cruise boat or beach sipping a pina colada, living there is quite different. And with summer temperatures in L.A. exceeding 110 routinely and no offshore Santa Ana breezes anymore, there was little left to stay for.

This brought a flood of cheap labor alongside the those who already been working the fields for three generations. Along the economic boost that Washington and Oregon received, the mass migration also brought the inevitable social services disaster too. Mayor Harken thought of the many families in her city that had come looking for work and settled down not because there were jobs to be had, but because they had family that were working. And welfare benefits in Washington weren't nearly as rich as they were in California either.

"It's a shame isn't it," she said absent-mindedly to the mid 20-year-old-or-so officer who sat stoically in the seat opposite her, who seemed to be taking a nap with his eyes open.

"What's that ma'am," said the soldier politely and clearly alert.

"How many times have I driven on this highway back and forth to college and the fields here in December were covered with snow? Sometimes, we could only go 25-30 miles per hour and I remember one epic trip home from college that actually took 6 hours."

"Yes ma'am. That is a shame. I understand that you're the mayor of Moses Lake? Care to tell your story?"

"You really want to hear this? Sergeant…" realizing she hadn't asked his name yet.

"Staff Sergeant Quilliam, ma'am, and I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want to know. We have 90 minutes to kill here," he said smiling for the first time since they'd gotten into the car.

Alice started with a wistful description of her college years. She had gone to school at a prestigious school (for the Northwest anyway) located in the middle of Spokane, just 100 miles from her home in Moses Lake. Nobody super notable had ever been graduated from the private liberal arts college, but the men's basketball team had made respectable showings during several seasons in the last couple decades.

She finished her poly sci degree with a minor in environmental studies before going on to get a Master's Degree in Public Administration at Cal-Berkley, the most liberal college in California. She had dreams of becoming a legislator and changing the backward policies of an inept congress who continued to deny man's role in global warming, among many other things. In addition to her passion for environmental politics, she also brought another passion with her to California – her new husband Daniel who had finished his undergraduate in environmental engineering. Their torrid romance was legendary in the Greek system on campus during their senior year

With her masters in hand, they moved back to her home town of Moses Lake, Washington.

The officer interrupted with a question, "Is it named Moses Lake because the highway runs through the middle of the lakes? You know, like Moses went through the Red Sea?"

Oh, OK, he really is interested, thought Alice. "No, but great question. The town was first called Neppel in 1910 and was a highly profitable lakeside orchard. But we became Moses Lake in 1938 when we officially incorporated, named after a local tribal area leader, Chief Moses. Back then – right before the war that is – it became the fastest growing community in Washington."

She went on to detail how the arrival of the Moses Lake Army Air Base, a new tourism industry, and abundant irrigation water fueled an agricultural boomtown as Moses Lake morphed into the population and service center of the Columbia River Basin. By the turn of the next century, the town only numbered around 15,000 people but was the anchor of the local economy.

Her husband Daniel quickly found a job testing water samples with the state. Alice could find nothing that suited her for six months and after sitting at home endlessly watching C-SPAN decided on a whim (with the help of some inheritance money) to throw herself into running for a state representative position at age 27 on an environmental platform. After a humiliating loss and incurring $10,000 in debt, the city's mayor, who was a longtime family friend, took her out to coffee and gave her some free and unsolicited advice. She described the encounter to the officer.

"You know what your problem is Alicia?" Mayor Evans asked, using the name he'd always called her. He didn't wait for an answer and didn't really care if she wanted to know. "You are all vim and vigor. You just graduated from college, you swagger back into town with your shiny Master's Degree, with your beau on your arm. And then you set yourself up to run for a statewide position without any history or knowledge here."

"I grew up here in Moses Lake," she began to protest before he raised his hand to stop her.

"Alicia – you haven't lived here for nearly a decade and even though you were student body president, you still didn't know squat about local politics. So you may have grown up here as a child, but you still have a lot more growing up to do here as an adult before people are going to pay any attention to you."

Alice hung her head, stung by the words, even though she knew he was right. She could barely raise her eyes from the greasy cup of coffee she swirled around in the cup.

The mayor lowered his voice. "Honey, you know I'm not trying to hurt your feelings. You know I love you and your family. Your dad was my right hand man, God bless his soul, and there's no way I could have run this town for the past 25 years without him.

"But dad-blum-it, Alicia." He raised and lowered his coffee cup down on the table just loud enough that a couple people turned their heads to look what had riled the even tempered mayor. He leaned forward, lowered his voice a little and held his gaze in her eyes. "People around here don't care how much you know until they know how much you care." The mayor let his last words hang in the air as if they should be written down in the book of Proverbs.

He took a long swig of coffee setting it down a little more quietly this time. "Now you can roll your eyes at me and throw your money away Alicia, but it's not going to get you elected if you don't live among the people first. I don't care how many liberal Californians have moved up here, besides the fact that half of them can't legally vote. You can't run on an environmental platform in Central Washington. This isn't Seattle. You grew up here and should be smart enough to know that Rep. Edwards has held that office since you were in diapers. You study his politics if you really want to get elected."

The waitress stopped by to top off their coffees but Mayor put his hand over his cup and said, "Thanks Rosie, I think that's probably enough for the day." Rosie poured some more for Alice and raised her eyebrows with an eyes-glazed-over look at Alice.

"Here's my advice, honey, take it or leave it. Settle into domestic life here, have some kids, get involved in your neighborhood association. Heck – come on down to City Hall and see if there's any jobs you can get your foot in the door with. Now, I can't pull any strings there – my new HR gal, Susie, runs everything by the books – but you can certainly use me as a reference and I'm hoping that is still worth something in this town."

"But I've got $45,000 in student loans to pay off. I can't settle for an $11 an hour job pushing paper!" she exclaimed, again drawing the attention of the other diner patrons.

"More like $55,000 if you reported your expenses correctly on your candidate forms." The mayor paused smugly for effect. "Now I know Daniel's job alone isn't going to dig you out from that anytime. And there are a lot of people in this town who would be grateful for $11 an hour."

Letting out a long sigh Alice leaned back in her bench, threw her head back and looked at the ceiling. She wanted the lecture to be over because she knew she he was right.

"Remember, I started out as a broom pusher in-", the mayor began before she cut him off.

"I know, I know. As a broom pusher in the library and then you worked your way up to mayor." The mayor pursed his lips together and looked down a little bit, obviously proud of his career in civic service. "You're right, you're right. It's just that I couldn't sit in my apartment all day watching our legislators make such a mess of things. I wanted to make a difference. I want to impact the world!"

"Oh You will Alicia Harken. You will. You just need to marinate in Moses Lake again for a little while and you'll come out tasting more palatable for the voters." The mayor grabbed his fedora to cover his balding head and got up. "Look, I gotta run an' get ready for the city council meeting tonight. So go down and talk with Susie in HR. Find out what's open and get something to put on your resume besides 'college graduate.' I'll see 'a around. Hey Chuck, hey Bill." He greeted a couple of guys as he opened the door, dinging the bell hanging over it. He stopped, turned and yelled, "You remind me of your dad, Alicia. And that's a good thing."

She liked the thought of being compared to her dad and it brought a bittersweet smile to her face. She got up and went to the cash register, reached into her purse for her wallet. Rosie yelled from Bill and Chuck's table, with the coffee carafe in her hand. "Honey, you gotta be faster than the mayor, he already got the check."

Rosie coming closer, setting the coffee down on the counter. "He really does care about people, doesn't he?"

"Yah, I guess he really does," Alice said quietly, wondering if Rosie wasn't rubbing in the mayor's proverbial statement just a little.

"Sorry about your campaign Alice. Better luck next time," she said and then lowered her voice. "For what it's worth, me and Vern voted for you, she said in a low voice. "We think it's time for some change, just a teensy bit," as she held her fingers up in an open pinch. "And hey, there's a job opening over at the library I hear. Might want to check it out. It's probably this small of of an opening too." Rosie snorted at her own joke.

Alice chuckled out loud. "What pushing a broom? Wouldn't that be ironic? I'll take a look. Thanks for your support and thanks for the tip. By the way, the coffee is burnt, Rosie."

"Well thanks for your tip too!" Rosie called out mockingly. They weren't the best of friends in high school, but had reacquainted themselves enough after Alice's return home enough to joke around.

And with that, Alice did find a job at the library, fortunately not pushing a broom, but pushing papers nonetheless. From there she moved into a better position at city parks, public works, and finally City Hall as a clerk. During those years, Alice miscarried twice but finally was able to have twins, Sierra and Alex. She eventually got involved in the PTO – becoming president the second year out of her sheer eagerness – and then precinct captain in her neighborhood.

"My big break came when Mayor Evans decided to end his 35 year career in civil service," she said to Sgt Quilliam. "I went to the courthouse, wrote a $50 check and filed the necessary papers for candidacy. I ran a campaign embracing the mayor's legacy but looking to the future of Central Washington and what we could do for farmers with different environmental practices and new technology. The time was right for some small change and I was lucky enough to get the mayor's support, even though I ran a Democrat.

"You see, Mayor Evans had no regard for the city councilman who decided to run as the Republican candidate. The guy was a complete buffoon and had made the mayor's last five years in office particularly miserable. So, he threw his name behind me, causing no small amount of gossip, and found that indeed, it still did carry some weight in our town.

She paused, ready to revel just a bit. "I won the election handily, 53 – 47% and at the age of 40, I suddenly found herself the mayor of Moses Lake Washington."

"Wow. That's quite the journey," said Quilliam. "It obviously turned out well for you."

"Well, yes and no." She took a deep swallow, knowing that she would have to get to this point in the story eventually. "Initially, I dove right into my job and quickly found success passing initiatives that were near my 'environmental bleeding heart.'" She wasn't sure about Quilliam's politics, but she often throughout this provocative moniker just to see if she could get a reaction..

"You know, because of the Columbia and Snake Rivers, the Northwest enjoys the cheapest electricity rates in the nation, thanks to all the hydro-electric dams. But here was my chance to finally do something, so I started small, with light bulbs. I got the council to agree to replace all the incandescent and halogen bulbs that we owned with fluorescents and LEDs, both inside and out.

"Then, I heard about some other cities which installed power generators in their dumps to turn all the methane into energy. We got that approved, so that had the double shot of reducing our carbon footprint, and making more power which we sold back to the utilities."

"Cool."

My big coup d'etat was retrofitting most of Moses Lake's big vehicles to use natural gas and all the smaller vehicles became hybrids. That move saved us $50,000 in gasoline in the first year, let alone reducing our carbon footprint again."

"I can see that this was an important theme in your administration."

"Well, it's not the only thing I did you understand. As mayor you still have to do all the ribbon-cuttings, and council meetings, and politics, and fund raising and all that. But this actually counted for something. In fact, I received an environmental leadership award from the National Association of Mayors after just five years in office." She beamed with obvious pride for a few moments.

And then, like a cloud that slowly passes in front of the sun, Sgt Quilliam watched as a sudden sense of dread and grief came over Alice's face. For it wasn't long after that that the first of two disasters fell on the mayor of Moses Lake, Washington.