Anyone else out there want to walk into the conference room where Democrats and Republicans are supposedly working on a compromise to fix our deficit problem? If you could get their attention, what would you say? I think a lot of us would tell them to stop posturing, stop drawing lines in the sand and get to work solving the problem.
If I could command their attention for five minutes I’d tell them to settle down. To recognize that most of us regular people have challenging problems at work too. But we go to work every day and we make the tough decisions; we come to the best conclusions given the information we have. We make those decisions, then we move on and begin to solve the next problem. We do it every day, and we don’t even get health insurance for the rest of our lives. Nor salaries anywhere near what they are earning to sit around and talk in circles, insult each other, and vie for television sound bites to make their views heard. Their main purpose seems to be getting reelected – rather than saving the economic health of our country. Which is sort of what got us into this mess in the first place.
Time is ticking people. The talking heads on the TV say that if we default we’ll head into “another recession.” Well, maybe they haven’t noticed that we’re not out of the current recession yet. Not by a long shot. So if we’re heading for another recession on the heels of this one… well… lots more people are going to be unemployed. Lots more homes will be defaulted on. Lots more homeless people will be looking for help from government agencies that won’t be funded.
Sounds bleak doesn’t it. So you people up there in DC, the ones that are supposed to understand all this, the ones we voted for to get us out of the jam we were in, the ones making the salaries, getting the glory, the huge retirement, the health insurance, the pension, you people need to get moving. You need to open your minds and open your hearts and figure out something that will save us all. Because the rest of us out here are watching. And we’re taking names.
Sorry. I’ll get off my soapbox now and return you to the regularly scheduled blog.
Alcatraz…what is there to say except that I’m glad I never lived there. Such sadness in such an idyllic spot with views to die for. Some did.
The cells were tiny, spare, hard. The best ones had sunlight. Solitary confinement cells didn’t have any light at all. We got to go inside a solitary confinement cell while the guard shut the door with a clang. Six or seven of us stood silent in the hot, humid total darkness.
Freedom makes a person smile.
So much tragedy here, the images are ghostly, faint, movie-like, and yet they were real. Much is told by people that lived the story. As one said, “Not much good came out of a stay on the rock.”
…the shape of a plant…
…the yawn of a bird.
This is an amazing place. A place to take away lessons about resiliency and hope.
A place I won’t soon forget.
Change Is Hard 