High School was either heaven or hell depending on who you talk to. Freshman year could be very difficult. Different classrooms, eating lunch in a noisy cafeteria for the first time and the pressure of making it into the in crowd. The secure world of elementary school was gone and left in its place was the daily stress trying to open a combination lock, grabbing the right books and making it to class on time.
As if the first day wasn't bad enough, in homeroom sat a beautiful girl. You know the kind. She was blessed with perfect everything. Girls wanted to be her. And boys wanted to have her. The rest worried about frizzy hair and zits. Not her. And what amazed us was how friendly she was to everyone. One morning while waiting for first bell I saw her talking to a boy who could have been her twin. She brought him over and introduced him. Her older brother was a junior. They came to school together everyday. It was obvious they were very close. He waited every afternoon to take her home before going to work.
The months passed quickly and soon it was winter break. Teachers piled on the homework that included lots of reading and term papers. Some break. Two weeks away from school and friends. Halfway through a snow storm dumped enough white powder to keep most housebound. It was not long before boredom set in and returning to school couldn't come fast enough.
That first morning back there was something palpably different. Students speaking in hushed tones. Odd sounding laughter. By lunchtime the whole school knew that some student had been seen in a club frequented by gays. Who? And how was it found out? After all if this student was seen wouldn't it make sense that the person who reported the sighting was gay too? By the end of the day the name was known by enough kids and it spread like wild fire. It was the protective brother of Miss Perfect.
The story was he was seen coming out of the club by a senior who was driving by at just the right moment. In no time at all the rumor mill was busy. Apparently it didn't take long for word to make it to the school office.
He never returned to school. He transferred to another school and took a job as a window dresser in a downtown department store. His sister transferred too. She never contacted any of her friends after that. Shortly before moving away I heard his sister married and her bother was not invited to the wedding.
This happened in New York many years ago. When being outed came with harsh consequences. If you were found out life would never be the same. Bullies and bigots made sure of that. And now a law has passed allowing gays to marry. So many years between then and now. I had not thought of that incident in so long, but watching the important vote that awful moment in time returned. Tears ran down my face. I wondered if he was able to reconnect with his family. Were they able to support him? Had he found love? It would be cruel if he had not. I closed my eyes and prayed that he was living the life he deserved.
So for those opposed to this new law ask yourselves how does this law hurt you. What rights do you lose? I JUST DON'T GET IT
Monday, June 27, 2011
Friday, June 24, 2011
Daily Kos: Rand Paul: America's hungry seniors should turn to charity
A Senate subcommittee on Primary Health and Aging, chaired by Sen. Bernie Sanders, held a hearing Tuesday on the “human toll and budget consequences” of senior hunger. Panelists shared tales of woe from older Americans unable to get enough food, and urged increased funding for nutrition programs under the Older Americans Act of 1965.
This might have been non-controversial a few years ago, but not with the Tea Party in town. The hearing produced a fierce debate between Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, and Sen. Rand Paul, the prototypical Tea Partier, about whether the government should even perform simple tasks like feeding hungry senior citizens....
Mary Jane Koren, a geriatrician and vice-president of the Commonwealth Fund, noted that seniors often suffer health problems and are put in nursing homes after falling down. Poor nutrition leads to decreased muscle strength, meaning a higher chance of falling—and weaker seniors are more likely to be gravely injured in such a fall. Koren noted that by 2020, the annual cost of medical care for seniors who fall is expected to reach $54.9 billion—many magnitudes more than the approximately $2 billion per year the federal government spends on nutrition assistance for senior citizens.
Sen. Paul, however, explicitly rejected this logic. “It’s curious that only in Washington can you spend $2 billion and claim that you’re saving money,” he said. “The idea or notion that spending money in Washington somehow is saving money really flies past most of the taxpayers.” Instead, Paul touted the “nobility of private charity” as opposed to government-funded “transfer programs.” He suggested privatizing Meals on Wheels and other government assistance for hungry seniors.
Sanders had none of this. “Senator Paul has suggested that only in Washington can people believe that spending money actually saves money. And I think that’s the kind of philosophy that results in us spending about twice as much per person on health care as any other country on earth,” Sanders said. “We have millions of millions of Americans who can’t get to a doctor on time. Some of them die, some of them become very, very ill and end up in the emergency room or end up in the hospital at great cost.
“Maybe it’s the same reason why we have more people in jail than any other country on earth including China, tied to the fact that we have the highest poverty rate among children among many other major countries on earth,” Sanders continued. “I happen to believe that intelligently investing in the needs of our people does in fact save substantial sums of money.”
In providing this explanation of how social investment works, and the consequences of not making it, Sen. Sanders is making the mistake of thinking that Sen. Paul a) has the capacity to understand what his talking about, and b) gives a shit that there are people dying because they don't have health care, or have to chose between it and starving. It highlights the great divide between the Republican party of 2011 and the rest of us, a distinction elected Democrats need to be calling out loudly and repeatedly. But in the new austerity-driven policy world, good luck with that.
This might have been non-controversial a few years ago, but not with the Tea Party in town. The hearing produced a fierce debate between Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, and Sen. Rand Paul, the prototypical Tea Partier, about whether the government should even perform simple tasks like feeding hungry senior citizens....
Mary Jane Koren, a geriatrician and vice-president of the Commonwealth Fund, noted that seniors often suffer health problems and are put in nursing homes after falling down. Poor nutrition leads to decreased muscle strength, meaning a higher chance of falling—and weaker seniors are more likely to be gravely injured in such a fall. Koren noted that by 2020, the annual cost of medical care for seniors who fall is expected to reach $54.9 billion—many magnitudes more than the approximately $2 billion per year the federal government spends on nutrition assistance for senior citizens.
Sen. Paul, however, explicitly rejected this logic. “It’s curious that only in Washington can you spend $2 billion and claim that you’re saving money,” he said. “The idea or notion that spending money in Washington somehow is saving money really flies past most of the taxpayers.” Instead, Paul touted the “nobility of private charity” as opposed to government-funded “transfer programs.” He suggested privatizing Meals on Wheels and other government assistance for hungry seniors.
Sanders had none of this. “Senator Paul has suggested that only in Washington can people believe that spending money actually saves money. And I think that’s the kind of philosophy that results in us spending about twice as much per person on health care as any other country on earth,” Sanders said. “We have millions of millions of Americans who can’t get to a doctor on time. Some of them die, some of them become very, very ill and end up in the emergency room or end up in the hospital at great cost.
“Maybe it’s the same reason why we have more people in jail than any other country on earth including China, tied to the fact that we have the highest poverty rate among children among many other major countries on earth,” Sanders continued. “I happen to believe that intelligently investing in the needs of our people does in fact save substantial sums of money.”
In providing this explanation of how social investment works, and the consequences of not making it, Sen. Sanders is making the mistake of thinking that Sen. Paul a) has the capacity to understand what his talking about, and b) gives a shit that there are people dying because they don't have health care, or have to chose between it and starving. It highlights the great divide between the Republican party of 2011 and the rest of us, a distinction elected Democrats need to be calling out loudly and repeatedly. But in the new austerity-driven policy world, good luck with that.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
When Is A Lack Of Empathy OK?
The unseasonable heat made sleep more elusive than normal. The upside was knowing at 4am fresh bagels would be available at the local coffee shop. Opening up the front door and walking out into the muggy air was still a surprise for the early hour. The drive did not take long as there was no traffic except for an 18 wheeler driving what I deemed to fast in an effort to make it through the traffic light before it turned red.
The coffee shop was cool, filled with the smells of baked goods, donuts, bagels and coffee. I was the only customer making it more than probable the transaction would be quick. Wrong.
A young woman came out of the kitchen wearing a brown apron covered in white powder. Had I not known she was "dusting" fried dough with confectionery sugar I might have assumed she was cutting cocaine. Perhaps my looking at it prompted her to explain she didn't bother to wash it as the work was so messy it made no sense. At the end of the week it would be put in the washer, made clean for the next week. I said something like, "It's too bad you don't have another one to wear." And she replied, "But I do." Oh, ok.
Now you may wonder why any conversation would be necessary at that early hour with no other customers keeping me waiting. The coffee shop had no decaf coffee brewed. Typically commercial brewers are much faster than the home variety but only when one knows how to use them.
As she poured the ground coffee into the pot and adding water I inquired if she was ever nervous about working alone and she said no because it was a good neighborhood and added the only time the shop had been robbed it was an "inside job" by a former employee. And it is a safe area except that during the more clement weather there are homeless people who come out of the woods from behind the shops and one needs to be careful. And in a most sincere voice she told me about a homeless man who came into the shop, during a recent rain storm, who messed up the floor with his muddy feet and booth he sat in.
With that I forgot about the coffee. How terrible to be without a home, I said. She informed me that she herself had lived in her car for six months as she had no home. This 20 something girl covered in powered sugar had lived in a manner she didn't ask for and yet held no empathy for the rain soaked mud tracker who made her use a mop.
How was that possible? Those two strangers had something in common..It could have been her rain soaked and hungry. Maybe her lack of feeling comes from being employed, with a roof over her head. Grateful those 6 months are now a memory she looks forward only to the future. But to be so cold. Does she not realize how large this country's homeless problem is? Does she even read a newspaper or watch the news? Or is she like so many others who feel its not their problem. Then whose problem is it?
I took the coffee and bagels and left thinking I just don;t get it.
The coffee shop was cool, filled with the smells of baked goods, donuts, bagels and coffee. I was the only customer making it more than probable the transaction would be quick. Wrong.
A young woman came out of the kitchen wearing a brown apron covered in white powder. Had I not known she was "dusting" fried dough with confectionery sugar I might have assumed she was cutting cocaine. Perhaps my looking at it prompted her to explain she didn't bother to wash it as the work was so messy it made no sense. At the end of the week it would be put in the washer, made clean for the next week. I said something like, "It's too bad you don't have another one to wear." And she replied, "But I do." Oh, ok.
Now you may wonder why any conversation would be necessary at that early hour with no other customers keeping me waiting. The coffee shop had no decaf coffee brewed. Typically commercial brewers are much faster than the home variety but only when one knows how to use them.
As she poured the ground coffee into the pot and adding water I inquired if she was ever nervous about working alone and she said no because it was a good neighborhood and added the only time the shop had been robbed it was an "inside job" by a former employee. And it is a safe area except that during the more clement weather there are homeless people who come out of the woods from behind the shops and one needs to be careful. And in a most sincere voice she told me about a homeless man who came into the shop, during a recent rain storm, who messed up the floor with his muddy feet and booth he sat in.
With that I forgot about the coffee. How terrible to be without a home, I said. She informed me that she herself had lived in her car for six months as she had no home. This 20 something girl covered in powered sugar had lived in a manner she didn't ask for and yet held no empathy for the rain soaked mud tracker who made her use a mop.
How was that possible? Those two strangers had something in common..It could have been her rain soaked and hungry. Maybe her lack of feeling comes from being employed, with a roof over her head. Grateful those 6 months are now a memory she looks forward only to the future. But to be so cold. Does she not realize how large this country's homeless problem is? Does she even read a newspaper or watch the news? Or is she like so many others who feel its not their problem. Then whose problem is it?
I took the coffee and bagels and left thinking I just don;t get it.
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