My girlfriend invited me and the kids over to her neighborhood pool yesterday. She lives in a beautiful community. Big, beautiful homes. Lovingly manicured lawns. Large lots. Multiple car garages. The curbs are Belgian block. The trees are hardwood, and tall. All situated atop a mountain. Really picturesque.
My girls played in the pool, and ran around in the sprinkler park. To say they had a fun day would be an understatement. I put them in the car to go home, and before I had even turned out of the community, Molly was out cold. So out cold, it was one of those times that I could change her diaper when we got home, and she never stirred. Good, hard, fun in the sun makes kids so sleepy, and so willing to go to bed, and me, very happy.
While we were at the pool, my girlfriend saw some of her neighbors there. They all began to talk about all of the people they knew up and down their block that had suddenly vanished. U-Hauls being loaded in the night, and houses discovered empty, only after the weeds began to take over the once carefully mowed lawns. They spoke of their children being disappointed because of the sudden end to friendships. Playmates gone with their family. No goodbyes. I guess maybe some too saddened by losing it all. Maybe it is easier to just look ahead, than to look back.
I often wonder if, and when, we finally have to leave our home, how will we feel. Will we go willingly, into the sun? Or will we want to quietly leave, into the night. No farewells. Just sorrow that we could not save what we worked so hard for.
I am not well versed politically. I cannot quite discuss that topic as well as others can. But I know what I see. And I see loss. I see people's lives changing in a manner that they cannot right, as hard as they work. They can't recover from job loss, and pay cuts. Corrections are being made for corporations and and even our own government, but they are not being corrected for the masses. The people who really need relief. The pendulum is not swinging far enough in the other direction.
Shopping in Shop Rite the other day (where the nicest people work!) I started talking to a woman who works there, and she told me how her husband had lost his job after 20 plus years at the same place, and was out of work for 18 months. In order to save their home, one that they had worked for their whole lives together, they had to empty out their retirement. And pay the penalty for doing so. They have no money set aside for their retirement. Not a penny.
That is what is making me crazed the most. People doing the right thing, their whole lives. People working hard, and creating lives for themselves, and having all of that pulled out from under them. I am not talking about those who have more than most. And those who live beyond their means. I am talking about hardworking Americans, who might not get to see the fruits of their labor. No pendulum is going to swing far enough in their direction.
There are a lot of us. I think it stinks.
My girls played in the pool, and ran around in the sprinkler park. To say they had a fun day would be an understatement. I put them in the car to go home, and before I had even turned out of the community, Molly was out cold. So out cold, it was one of those times that I could change her diaper when we got home, and she never stirred. Good, hard, fun in the sun makes kids so sleepy, and so willing to go to bed, and me, very happy.
While we were at the pool, my girlfriend saw some of her neighbors there. They all began to talk about all of the people they knew up and down their block that had suddenly vanished. U-Hauls being loaded in the night, and houses discovered empty, only after the weeds began to take over the once carefully mowed lawns. They spoke of their children being disappointed because of the sudden end to friendships. Playmates gone with their family. No goodbyes. I guess maybe some too saddened by losing it all. Maybe it is easier to just look ahead, than to look back.
I often wonder if, and when, we finally have to leave our home, how will we feel. Will we go willingly, into the sun? Or will we want to quietly leave, into the night. No farewells. Just sorrow that we could not save what we worked so hard for.
I am not well versed politically. I cannot quite discuss that topic as well as others can. But I know what I see. And I see loss. I see people's lives changing in a manner that they cannot right, as hard as they work. They can't recover from job loss, and pay cuts. Corrections are being made for corporations and and even our own government, but they are not being corrected for the masses. The people who really need relief. The pendulum is not swinging far enough in the other direction.
Shopping in Shop Rite the other day (where the nicest people work!) I started talking to a woman who works there, and she told me how her husband had lost his job after 20 plus years at the same place, and was out of work for 18 months. In order to save their home, one that they had worked for their whole lives together, they had to empty out their retirement. And pay the penalty for doing so. They have no money set aside for their retirement. Not a penny.
That is what is making me crazed the most. People doing the right thing, their whole lives. People working hard, and creating lives for themselves, and having all of that pulled out from under them. I am not talking about those who have more than most. And those who live beyond their means. I am talking about hardworking Americans, who might not get to see the fruits of their labor. No pendulum is going to swing far enough in their direction.
There are a lot of us. I think it stinks.
Erin, this one is so sad to read. Go with your head up and in a matter-of-fact way, and just start again. You have your family, and some of the richest people lose that, but it's never because of the economy. You have nothing to be ashamed of. At all...you are always welcome here. there are solutions to everything. Really.
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