Sorry about that, new to this site, other places, the reply button puts the quote and response together...did not notice this one did not...

thanks for the heads up..

Lewis : 0 )

Sorry, I'm pretty passionate about life and the nature of the problems we contribute to or work against. Wasn't attempting to be a father figure; but we do become our fathers and mothers sometimes; usually because human problems and responses do not change as a rule.

From a generational prospective, the greatest conformity is the essence of rebellion. What what each generation does and compare it the previous and I think you will see what I mean.

Maybe the question you should ask yourself, like I did at one time, should be...What makes me feel the way I do to begin with. If I sounded like your father, I apologize, not here to give a sermon, just my opinion like everyone else..but if i evoked some emotion in you..maybe it wasn't what I said; but what it reminded you of.

The paths not taken, or the ideas, or ideals not thought about. I am a teacher and scientist, so I do tend to jump on the "diatribe" wagon to often. One of the reasons I come hear and other places to write, is that it pulls my proverbial chain, and helps keep my ego in check. We all need it sometimes.

Thanks for the reminder, and hope you take my thoughts as they are intended.

Lewis..

P.S.

I don't know about your father; but mine once said, that he would get smarter as I got older, I was lucky enough to reach an understanding of how good my father is, and that he was right.

Have a nice day : 0 )

Your right, in our country hunger does occur to the marginalized few, nothing will ever be perfect. Sometimes being poor is a generational thing; it was in my family, sometimes its the nature of the community that a person chooses to live in, or community you feel safe in, even if you go hungry everyone once in while.

When I was in my twenties, I spent some months on the streets of New Orleans living hand to mouth, saw the worst and the best. My daughter had developed an infection, and went into a coma and was expected to die. Somewhere along the line, I found myself walking I new not where. I had lost myself, and was not even aware of it.

Most homeless and poor fall into somewhat the same category. You live day to day, week to week, many choose drugs, others abuse, because they were abused and find a rational of sorts in that. Many of us, myself at that time, simply fade out, no will, there emotions so charged with pain that they can't see anything as a relieve; but death.

Some choose it overtly, others wonder around hoping that life will just take them.

Those who survive become weaker in there justification of the abuse they show others, the lucky few find something to live for, and slowly find there way back.

I was lucky, I worked my way back, and ultimately my daughter did eventually wake up, although she will always be a perpetually happy four year old, I still see glimmers of who she was before the incident, and that is enough to keep me working.

The nature of empathy is that you can have to much and not enough in the balance of your life. You can bleed so much, that you lose yourself, or bleed so little that you never find a connection to live for.

Being poor is the least of those things that can happen to a person; but you are right it does contribute to how a person grows and learns. The difference between the saint and the sociopath, the Dahmer and the Mother Teresa, is having that one person, at that one critical moment in each person's life, stretch out a hand in love and be what they need for that moment.

Part of our problem today, is the self-involved attitude that others must do for us what we can't. That's not to say that many do not need help at times; but we both know that for many of our society, knowing the governmental net, or community net is there, they do not challenge themselves to the level of becoming stronger. They choose the easy path that makes them weaker and weaker until they are unable to stand on there own.

What's the old saying...."God let's you fall, so that you learn to pick yourself up"....it worked for me...and it works for many others. Certainly its not a placebo or solution for all people; but it is where we should all start.

Have a nice day

lewis : 0 )

The best you can come up with is "Amen" after such a terrible diatribe. The poetry was inventive, the invective disturbing. The behavior and the quotes falling to the lowest level of the politicians they rile against.

When will people understand that governments are only who we put into our office, by what we do or do not do. The pessimist complains, the optimist takes action.

The support of individuals who whine and complain while sometimes funny, and many times more, sad; takes our self-esteem as a community, and marginalizes the very nature of what so many have died for over the years. The right to choose! You can choose to do nothing, choose to whine or complain, or you can take your responsibilities seriously and make a choice to speak up.

History is full of people being the catylst, that one voice that speaks up and tells everyone the "Emperior is not wearing any cloths", and showing the rest of us the nature of our delusion.

Have a nice day....

but if your going to say "Amen", make it worth something. Your friends, neighbors and community deserve better from you.

Lewis : 0 )

Practical is good, but if that is all that you are, you are missing out, on the greatest parts of life. Balance is what most need to succeed. We need money if we choose to exist as part of the society we live in. It should not be the end-all-be-all of your life though. Just one of the paths to living with and loving those that surround you.

Have a nice day..

Lewis

Hi everyone, and I can appreciate that many of you consider yourself poor; but to be honest you don't even understand the concept of poor. I spent the last couple of years in Iraq and Afghanistan building schools and feeding kids.

Poor is watching your kids go hungry, and knowing that you cannot feed them today, or maybe not this week. This is the kind of poor my parents went through in the thirties during the depression.

Very few in this country cannot find food, shelter, or medical care if they know how to go out and ask. That recourse did not exist for my parents nor most of the third world countries.

I'm not attempting to insult you or start a competition in who can be the poorest, just letting you know the relative position you are in, and that things can certainly get worse.

Seeing the glass is half-full, seeing what you have, for many keeps the hope alive. If you have hope, you have everything you need to find your way to success.

So when your having a bad day, make the effort to help someone else; you will find that the effort makes you stronger, and that of the person you helped.

Hope everyone has a nice day

Lewis : 0 )