Sitting a few weeks later on a sunny patio at her home in Norman, Oklahoma, Leja said she volunteered for the act of civil disobedience because she believes oil from Canada's tar sands is toxic and a major contributor to greenhouse gases. She is equally upset that TransCanada, which is building the pipeline, is seizing some Oklahomans' land by use of eminent domain. "We're sitting on this beautiful land and only corporations are benefiting from it," Leja said.

Leja, who has blue eyes, boyish hair, and often wears an orange stocking cap with long tassels that end in puffballs, is a foot soldier in an obscure but volatile front in the long war against Keystone XL.

Conventional wisdom is that the