Date:                           July 26, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

1400

            It is a cloudy Saturday afternoon at the Grand Island KOA and Connie and I have just finished our morning chores which consisted of providing our campground with a pancake breakfast.  It is a time to meet and greet all of the adventurous people that brave the morning air and threat of rain to enjoy our offering.  Until we arrived here I did not know that I could cook pancakes on any type of a regular schedule.  I have learned that I can flip a fry cake about as well as anyone.  The customers have been very kind and pretend to enjoy the breakfast.  They even stop to thank me on their way back to their site, sometimes, complimenting me on the tasty breakfast.  Actually, Connie does all the work in mixing the batter and all I have to do is pour it out on to the griddle and flip the cake halfway through the cooking.  I gratefully take their compliments anyways.

            This morning I had an experience that I must pontificate on just a bit.  I know you were expecting no less.  If you have spent much time reading my prior blogs you are quite aware that I often do just that.

            There are many cabins that surround the pool area where we have our breakfast.  It is in these wooden denizens that we often have families set up house and enjoy the experience “camping” at our KOA.  The cabins are little more than a wooden tent, but seem to be very popular with many people.  They are not cheap, but they are popular.  In two of these log houses we have family gathering this weekend of some 12 or so people.  These huts have beds for 4 people each so it must be interesting sleeping arrangements.  Most of the occupants are young and I am sure quite able to sleep on the floor in a sleeping bag or such.  It is the interaction with some of the young boys that inspires my blog today.

            After breakfast my wife let me know that there was a lot of noise coming from the men’s room and requested that I investigate.  The boys from the afore mentioned cabins had already made their presence know to all staff members at the campground by racing their skateboards up and down the sidewalk in front of our Rec Hall and by being less than pleasant in the swimming pool.  It was now to be my opportunity to interact with the group of young dark skinned full blooded boys.

            As I entered the shower room there was a lot of noise and inappropriate behavior being exhibited by this group of very over energetic young fellows.  I had previously had a few talks with them about using proper behavior and safe actions around public areas and was, by this time, not full of patience and calm understanding.  In a rather gruff and very adult voice I kicked the lot of them out of the restroom.  One poor young fellow asked, with a slightly fearful look his face, if he was going to be allowed to finish getting dressed.  I told him that if his behavior did not immediately improve I did not care if he went running naked into the parking lot.  He decided to quickly regain his proper composure and soon exit the restroom fully clothed.  His other companions had already gathered all of their belongings scattered to the four winds looking for safety.

            This is not an odd situation, nor an unexpected event in a campground.  Kids will be brats at times and often those times are at a campground.  It was in reflection that I feared that these kids might cry foul.  I was an old white man yelling at a group of black kids.  In so many times in our society a clamor of racism might swell up from this situation.  It did not this time, but the fear that it might did cloud my mind for a moment.  I was not acting in a racist manner, but that may not be the deciding factor many times.

            It was at this time that I realized that it was not the thought of racism that entered into this situation until my fertile imagination entered a reflective state.  It was not a racist urge that prompted me to act.  It was the simple act of inappropriate behavior that spurred me.  Mischievous boys are not bound or fueled by color.  They are fueled by unbridled energy and the need to test boundaries.  These young gentlemen had learned my boundaries this morning and if they viewed them through color sensitive lenses that was their choice. Both the boys and I know that by the way they quickly obeyed me that they had been caught on the other side of a fence of proper behavior that we both understood.  Proper behavior and actions are not color relevant nor should the enforcement of those rules be color selective.

            I do not know if the world changed this morning.  Race relations have not been improved nor damaged by my morning experiences.  I did notice that, in my behavior, my actions are most often directed by deep rooted feelings of fairness and expected proper behavior, not color tainted bigotry.  I also realized that deep within my unbiased soul society has placed a fear that I might be governed by inappropriate racist behavior and that I must be aware of that ill.  It is sensitivity that an age of inequality dictates.  We have made strides, but the dream is not yet a full reality.  I also learned that honest enforcement of rules is seldom a problem and is accepted by both the enforcer and the violator.

            It may not have been an epiphany of knowledge that I experienced this morning, but it was something to think about as I cleaned the dishes and wiped off the griddles.  And now, you too have walked through the cobwebs of my mind.

Wfdo2@msn.com

Date:                           July 23, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

0900

            Another busy weekend and another series of longs days at the Grand Island KOA are behind Connie and me and it is on to the living the life of a retired full timer.  When we are enjoying the “activity team” assignment it is difficult to call this work, but at the end of a busy weekend we do feel a bit exhausted.  This weekend was no exception and it has taken us a couple of days to return to whatever normal might be considered.  After our short work day Monday we spent most of the rest of the day trying to find our tails.  They were dragging somewhere behind us and we needed a bit of down time to see if we could elevate them to a regular buoyant position.  It was a chore that we did finally accomplish.

            On Tuesday we are supposed to be in the beginning of our “weekend” except that my lovely wife has a penchant for helping out and volunteered to cover for our park manager at the days “Color Time” activity.  What a nice lady.  I got to stay home and catch up on house chores.  Yes, I do help out around the house on occasion.  I may not be a great help, but I do my miniscule bit and it allowed us to go and play the afternoon away.  Even old geriatric retirees need a day or two of play on periodic occasions.  It is from this sojourn that my morning diatribe will emanate.

            Even on our time off we were doing “work” as we ventured out to accomplish some of shopping needed to replenish he supplies we used over the last weekend at the campground.  This is not a major burden to us and we needed some personal replenishing of our larder so it was not a big sacrifice to us.  We headed out on our shopping rounds and planned a visit to an Old Country Buffet as a treat to us for all the hard work we had accomplished over the weekend.  We were very successful on many levels.  We found most of the supplies we needed and we found an Old Country Buffet, all though it was not the one we had originally planned on attending.  It seems that the sign was still on the building, but all of the insides were someplace else.  Bless Sackie, she found an other place for us to fill out tummies and we arrived just minutes after most of Buffalo arrived to enjoy the over abundance of food.

            It is a shocking revelation to watch the amount of food that is consumed at a buffet by we Americans.  This Old Country Buffet was located in a shopping plaza that is not at its top in performance.  There are some stores located I in the plaza but it is not, obviously, one of the most popular shopping destinations in Buffalo.  This restaurant was, however, a very popular food destination and we actually had a slight problem finding a table at which we could eat.  The tables remained full and occupied all the time we were there and we did not notice sign of declining patrons as we left.  Plates were traveling up and down the aisles from table to buffet counter in a constant parade of over weight and under exercised food revelres.  I must admit that I also, probably, fit in that category.  At least, the eager food revelers did get some exercise as they trudged from their tables to the troth.

            After our foray into over eating, at least on my part, Connie and I decided it would be a nice thing to walk off some of our calories at the nearest mall.  We were in the market for an apron to use at the arts and crafts activity at the campground and we felt we might find something at a mall.  We were kind of wrong, but not totally.  The point at which I am headed is that we found one apron in the mall and it was a rather large mall.  There is just not the demand for aprons in today’s world.

            What does this have to do with the way the world turns, you ask?  It seems that we do not have the “at home” cook mentality in today’s busy world.  Why would you need an apron if you are not going to cook?  I sadly remember the picturesque scene with a mom standing in the kitchen, apron draped around her with steam and the aromas of a fresh meal filling the house making it a true “HOME.”  Today we do not see that scene and anecdotally we do not seem to need stores to carry aprons to sell to those picturesque statues of virtue and Americana.  We have become a country of fast food, buffet stuffing over weight Americans.  I have to believe that somewhere there is a connection between the lack of tables at a buffet and the lack of aprons at the mall.

            As Connie and I strolled off our evening meal at the under shopped mall I could not help but pontificate to my wife the failings of America as I saw them.  Somehow, in my simple mind, I was making a connection between over weight and under exercised buffet attendees and the lack of aprons in American malls.  I think that if you take a moment to reflect you will, at least, understand my weird foray into tangled logic. You might even find, deep in your logical mind, a stronger reason to support my postulations.

            Connie and I did have a good meal while eating with a few hundred of our closest friends from Buffalo.  We did, wisely, decide to walk off a few of the calories we consumed at the buffet troth.  And, I did get a subject on which I could fill a page or two on my blog.  It was a pretty good day in reflection.

Wfdo2@msn.com

Date:                           July 15, 2008 

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

0900

            It is not raining in my life this morning. If that statement is as non informational as it seems, you may need to read one of my previous post.  Having given you that information, it is truly a beautiful day on Grand Island.  At least meteorologically it is a bright blue morning with the hint of a cool breeze bathing me in comfort as I sit before my PC this morning.  Metaphorically things are also calm and clear, but maybe not as pristine as Mother Nature has provided on this day.

            Our weekend was much slower than we might have desired.  It was still a bit busy at times and fun to interact with the families that did brave the high cost of fuel and camping to enjoy the pleasure of fellowship of each other on a somewhat pleasant weekend.  We did have a storm come through the campground that blew an awning off a class A motorhome just across the street form our Fun Center and at one time I did see my wife chasing a rather large umbrella down the street in a driving rain storm, but it was mostly a pleasant weekend.  It can be exciting to see how wet a person can get in a very short amount of time when the heavens open up and dump buckets of rain water on everything.  I was wisely inside and under cover as all of this excitement unfolded and managed to remain much dryer.

            It was interesting how everyone that did brave the short torrential downpour managed to quickly get back into the spirit of having fun and enjoying the most available entertainment once the excitement of flying umbrellas and awnings was over.  They were involved in making tie dye t-shirts, and around here that is important.  As long as I could stay ahead of the pools of leaking rainwater on the floor of our Fun Center, and the campers could find a cover under which they could dip their twisted and knotted white t-shirt to make colorful twisted designs of art, life was good.  Life may have been a bit damp, but life was good.

            On Sunday we had our weekending pancake breakfast which can be a bit hectic.  This weekend we had a campground manager trainee as our able bodied assistant and things seemed to be progressing quite well.  On Saturday he had also been our server and odd job assistant and Connie and I had both enjoyed meting and getting to know him.  He has much experience in running and owning campgrounds previous to his entrance into the world of KOA and it was, at least, interesting getting to see his vigor and energy as he enters a new career at the borderline age of early retirement.  On this morning our pancake breakfast was not being too stressed and he was just filling in until he had other duties to perform.  Actually as the early morning unfolded we had our supplies prepared for a busy morning and by the near end of the first hour we had but one customer.  We were not overly stressed.  As such, Pat decided that he could be of much more value reporting to his next assignment a bit early and not just conversing with us.  We could not help but agree and wish him well as he headed to the reservation desk to spend the day.

            Guess what happened the moment he disappeared from sight.  Of course, everyone in the campground decided to show up for breakfast prior to leaving and making the drive home.  So, Connie was running everything else as I flipped pancakes as fast as was humanly possible.  The rush of customers did not last a long time, for the campground was not all that busy.  But for a moment or two we were not really sure which way was up or down.  The customers were very patient and tolerant; they all did get their plate of pancakes, eventually.  And, we managed to stay almost even with the demand.  We managed to keep some of our sanity and by days end we felt like it had been a pretty good day.

            As I started this entry, it is a nice day on Grand Island and we are still staying ahead of the demand.  Connie is sequestered in the laundry room, I have had a long chat with one of our neighbors about nothing and everything, and I have just finished my blog for the day.  I hope that your day will be or has been as successful and productive.

Wfdo2@msn.com

Date:                           July 12, 2008 

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

0600

            Yes the time is right and this just a test.

It is your turn to tell me how the weather is in your life.  Please drop us  note at the e-mail address listed below.

            Have a great day.

Wfdo2@msn.com

Date:                           July 11, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

0830

            I awoke this morning to the sounds of pitter patter on our home.  Yes, it was raining in my world and sadly in my life.  Metaphorically, it is not a tumultuous storm in either my life our in my world.  But, it is still a drizzly day.

            Do not fear.  I will not bore you with a stroll down self pity lane.  Nor will I spend a lot of my valuable leisure time regaling my misfortunes of life.  In reality, nothing is as bad from someone else’s perspective as it may seem from yours.  And, if we are honest, most people really don’t give a damn about your stubbed toe when they are lingering over a broken heart, or what ever.  Have I lost you yet?

            As I said, I awoke to a bit of rain in my world this morning.  That may be a good thing.  Connie and I took a much needed escape drive along the Niagara River, which is really not a river, and could not help but be alarmed by the seemingly over dry lawns in dire need of water.  This morning that cry for moisture is being addressed, I hope.

            A slight aside, if I may.  The Niagara River is not a real river because it is a connection between two large lakes:  Lake Erie and Lake Ontario.  As such this stretch of fast running and bountiful supply of water is truly a straight.  So in actuality, the Niagara River is really the Niagara straight between the two Great Lakes of Erie and Ontario.  Are you not a bit smarter now?  You’re glad you read this.

            On our slow path of escape yesterday, Connie and I stopped at the Silo for lunch.  It is a real silo located along the above mentioned straight and serves an adequate lunch.  The prices are a bit high, but we arrived just after every other tourist in the state and had to wait in a long line to order our haystack and hamburger.  When we left, the line seemed just as long as when we arrived and people were still waiting to reach into their pockets and pay 5 dollars for a mediocre hamburger.  I guess they can charge anything they want.

            The best reason to stop here is the offering of lunch beverage.  They make a $2.99 milkshake.  So what you ask.  It is a real milkshake, made with milk and ice cream, real ice cream.  They add a little syrup for flavor and many scoops of real ice cream.  Needless to say, I always have a strawberry shake.  Connie was even tempted today and finished a 16 ounce chocolate shake.  I promised to help her finish it if she could not handle the full cup of rich dessert beverage, but I noticed that as she deposited her cup in the proper receptacle it was very empty.  They are very good and, almost, erase the shock of paying too much for too little food.

            After lunch we decided that home was not the direction we needed to pursue at this time so we headed up along the shore of Lake Ontario.  Not a big adventure, but a beautiful reprieve form yellow and frustration.  The day was sunny, the lake was glistening and it was nice to enjoy the beauty of rural New York.  It is a beauty that we may take for granted at times and today was not to be one of those times.  It is not the dramatic beauty of the stark desert surrounded by towering crags of the Rockies, but there is a subtle beauty of rolling lush green filled with tress of every type.  Oaks, maple, and other deciduous giants are mingled in with the pine evergreens that will for ever hold there shade.  It is a relaxing beauty and a beauty that can be missed even if you are enjoying the exotic charm and majesty of other areas of our country.  It was a good drive.

            As we were slowly enjoying the charm of upstate New York we passed a small hidden campground located along the lake shore.  As we passed my lovely wife said that friends of ours stayed at that camp ground and, maybe we should go look just for fun.  A quick U-turn on an isolated road and slow entrance into the park found us sneaking up on grandma and her grandsons playing at a swing set.  Yes, our friends do live here and the grandparents we babysitting. 

            Sometime it is great to take a little detour in life and see what may be down the road not normally traveled.  We had a great afternoon catching up on old news, new news and plain old gossip news.  When we left we may have felt a little less sorry for our selves and we had a smile in our hearts to break the clouds of rain that had been forecast for the day.  Friends can heal more wounds by being friends and not doing anything than all the self pity in world can accomplish in an eon.

            It is still drizzling both metaphorically and in reality, but Connie and I are now very aware that if we should ever be driving along route 18 on the shore of Lake Ontario there is a welcome mat waiting our presence and that is a warm comforting fact.  So if you are driving down a sullen lane in your life and you see a side road that leads to a friend’s door, slow down, make the turn and someone’s life will be brightened.  Out of almost everything a little good can be found.

Date:                           July 8, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

1000

            It is a few days after our Nation’s birthday and Connie and I are just now beginning to catch our breath.  It is a lot of work to be the activity team at a very busy campground on that campgrounds busiest day of the year.  It is a lot of work, but at most times it is also a lot of fun.  Yes, working 14 hour days, dealing with some customers that are less than happy, and almost ignoring your visiting family can be fun; sort of.

            Our family came to visit us for the national celebration and the thank-you that they received is that w put them to work.  There were times, this weekend, that they were our saviors.  The extra pair of hands, extra smile and even the extra pair of legs which might be assisted by crutches came in very handy.  During our 2 very popular morning pancake breakfasts they were invaluable.  As is the way with “decent people” everyone pitched in and success was but a foregone conclusion.

            A slight aside, as you might have expected if you are a regular reader of my intellectual forays into blogging, I must tell you a simple story about part of our weekend.

            It was Saturday morning and I had been flipping pancakes as if they were actually good to eat and the word had gotten out.  We were to do more business this morning than we normally would do on a full weekend, or two mornings.  The people were very patient and we were serving them as fast as I could pour a, sometimes, very strange shape of batter on the grill and let it “bake” for a moment and flip it once to toast on the reverse.  I would then place it on a plate and Beth would run it to a table of hungry campers who would devour it.  The system worked quite fine.  Our family was helping out, for free, and Connie and I were almost keeping up with the demand.  It was frantic, fast and demanding, but the customers were pleasant, the weather was fantastic and the time was on a rocket sled streaking around the clock.

            During this constant onslaught of hungry campers our housekeeping team came in for their breakfast.  Normally they arrive during a very slow period in our morning and receive their free breakfast before they trudge on to make our restroom facilities as clean as is humanly possibly.  This morning was not to be the normal.  When they arrived it was very evident that it was not only not slow but it was bordering on disorganized ciaos.  I was running around like a chef with is head cut off and so was every other member of my family, even some on crutches.  I apologized for my inability to serve them, but promised that just as soon as I could their breakfast would be coming up.

            Now at this point they could have done one of many things.  They could have had a seat and taken a very well deserved rest. I realized that if I was this busy one can only imagine the amount of cleaning they had already done to serve this overflow crowd.  If they had chosen they could have stood over me causing me some stress and frustration waiting for their morning breakfast as soon as I could flip a cake their way.  They could have walked around the group campsites and look for lost change as some other work kampers had done previously.  Instead they decided to pitch in and help me catch up with this maddening crowd and help alleviate the stress under which we all were now trying to perform.  They just pitched in and worked at making our job easier.  The whole activity team was the better for their efforts, both the paid members of our team and the drafted unpaid members.

            Are these not the wonderful souls we all wish to meet as we travel through life?  They were willing to shoulder a little more burden to help lift the weight off of fellow team members backs.  They are an example, of the true worthy souls we meet as we travel around this country.  They are willing to be an additive contributor to the aid and benefit of their fellow man.

            Is this the end of the story? Of course not, why else would I have spent so much time getting to this point?  It seems that after they had help to remove some of our stress and provided a glimpse into the value of their individual souls a fellow housekeeping team member yelled at them.  They were chastised for helping someone else.  It was, according to this Neanderthal, not their job to help us.  The fact that, at that moment they had nothing they could do was not relevant.  They could just walk around the group campsites and look for dimes or something.  That would really impress this crowd of over charged campers to see a bunch of yellow shirts walking around like a pack of vultures accomplishing nothing except lining their own pockets with the pennies that accidently fell from someone else’s.

            Our morning went on and was very successful.  I still need to get to our visiting guardian angels and again thank them for their assistance.  I am sure I will try to apologize for the stupidity and unthinking of the slugs that inappropriately accosted them.  I am also sure that you might guess which of these team members I would choose to make an attempt to assist in any future moment.  I do know which of these team members have a soul and heart of which I can find reason to compliment.

            Offering assistance should never be wrong not should it be a source of rebuke.  But when it is I can only hope that you heart is warmed by the appreciation of the people you aided and that the sounds of the unearned chastisement fall on deaf ears, or you can at least consider the source.  Your soul has been enriched and your character has been duly recognized by the person that you assisted or at least by the God that you worship.

Date:                           July 4, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

0815

            Happy Birthday America.  I will not spoil this festive day with by ever so valuable opinion of where or how our country is doing.  I wasted enough time on that the other day.  I will not even expound on the fact that the real birthday of our country has already past and very few people even cared to celebrate it.  Look it up, we are celebrating the announcement of the birthday today and not the real event.  What I would like to rail about this morning is the inability of me especially to predict or plan anything that is affected by the weather.

            Yesterday was the beginning of our campground’s celebration of the 4^th of July.  It is also the, hopefully, beginning of a bit more activity around this place.  To get the long weekend off to a celebratory start Connie and I decided it might be fun to offer our campers a make shift snack shop upon their arrival. We had practiced this on a previous weekend and were planning on having “Grand Island Steamers”, Connie’s new name for steamed hotdogs, and assorted other snacks available on the porch as the weekend revelers arrived.  We planned on having music blaring and an ambience of festivity surrounding the registration area as our weekend visitors arrived.  It sounded like a great plan.

            When I woke up, yesterday, the weather did not seem to want to assists us.  The sky was bleak and foreboding and the sound of constant pitter patter was splashing off our motorhome.  I figured that standing in the rain to sell a hotdog was not going to be much fun and I figures that few people would really want to eat a hot dog from a soggy rain soaked bun.  After consulting my fabulous PC and broadband card I decided that a large line of nasty weather was coming from Michigan and the experts were predicting a steady onslaught of rain and nasty weather all day long.  It was supposed to last at least until early evening.  Bummer, this is not a good thing.

            Being the management mentality I am I asked my wife if we could change the plans just a bit.  Instead of being outside in the rain in front of the store, we could set up in the Fun Center and offer our fun to the campers in the confines of a dry recreation hall.  After she looked at the weather forecast and the radar images she agreed.  It was now our work to place new posters around the campground and set up our new make shift snack bar in the protective covering of our recreation hall.  This sounds like a pretty good idea and very intelligent on our part.

            As we were preparing the area for our hotdog steamer, cheese warmer, we also were offering nachos, and placing our sodas and candy bars on the counter the skies opened up.  It not only rained it became a torrential down pour.  Boy, did we feel smart.  What a great idea!  We were protected, the campers could find some dry solace to their weekend and we could sell them a hotdog.  What a smart idea we had had.

No sooner had we made our final electrical connection, placed our package of hotdogs in the steamer and placed our concessions on the counter, then the rain stopped.  It just turned off as quickly and abruptly as it had started.  Well this was not a bad thing.  It had been predicted that is was going to go through these horrendous storms all day and we were prepared.

Well, it did not rain all day long.  It did not rain half the day. It did not rain again.  Our well conceived plan had just been laughed at by Mother Nature.  There is one thing in life that you can plan on and that is that you can not plan on the weather doing anything it is supposed to do.  We still ran our snack bar.  It was far from a rousing success.  We did not get terribly wet, but than nether did anyone else in the campground who found much better things to do than come and visit our little respite form the torrential downpour that never arrived at the Grand Island KOA.

I am not looking for sympathy.  I am sure that you are not offering any.  I just wanted you to live vicariously in my life for just a few moments.  And, maybe feel the frustration of attempting to plan anything that can be dependant on Mother Nature doing what she has been predicted to do.

Have a great 4^th of July.  Don’t look at the weather channel before you make your plans.  They have no idea what is going to happen and will lie about it just to keep your attention.

Date:                           July 2, 2008

Location:                    Grand Island, NY

1000

            Sipping my morning coffee and preparing for another day at the Grand Island KOA I can not help but think about the winds of change and how they are so often ignored.  We each awake every morning to a new world and yet we think that we are just continuing in the same rut in which we fell asleep the previous night.  On a simple scale this may be true.  We are still living the life we were yesterday, we are still, hopefully, with our partner with whom we spent the previous day, and we are still the same person.

Yet, everything has changed.

            One morning we wake up and we are no longer in a stick home in Bath, we are on an Island in the middle of a straight of water that connects to of the world’s Great Lakes.  And, we are living in a bus.  When did it all change?  We awake on a morning and turn on the news and a black man is running for president, gallon of gas is nearly $5.00, and we are mired in two wars in a land that most ff us can’t find on a map.  And, oh yes, our president and country’s leadership lied about the reasons we went to war and now most of the world looks down their collectives noses at us for the hypocrite we a have become as a country.  When did everything change?

            The winds of change are tumultuously blowing every second of every day, yet we seem to ignore the shifting sands of reality as we plod along in our simple little lives.  Then we awake one day and everything has turned to ka ka and we wonder how it happened.  When did everything change so drastically and why did not someone try to prevent it from getting this messed up?

            I do not have answers to these questions.  I do not know if anyone does.  I do think it is an area of thought we all should visit and contemplate on the real ramifications.  Political maneuvering and posturing does affect you and every person on this earth.  A failure form Texas did wonder into the White House and now we are watching the world, along with this country, pay the price for failure of our electorate.  It maters not if he was elected or illegally appoint to office the failures of the Bush administration is, and will for the duration of our lives cause pain and trauma to us as a country and as individuals.  Yet there are still 1 in 5 or more people that still support this idiot.  A trashed constitution will survive over time it is the people that are ruled under it that I fear are going to suffer.  Now is when everything is changing.

            The winds of change are rustling through our lives as we sip our morning coffee and watch our “reality” TV show.  I know not how to redirect the blowing chaos to a more proper direction.  I know not even which proposed leader would best lead us in that effort.  I do know that if we set idly by the continued tempest of changing winds will lead to a very different world and I am not sure it is a better world.  I wish I could advise you on how to attempt a mid course correction.  Maybe if I can just get you to notice that we are, indeed, in the midst if a tornado of destructive changes I will have accomplished a small bit of my effort at corrective direction changes.  If I fail, you can continue sipping your coffee, watching your soap operas, and complaining about the price of eggs.  But, I will fear for the world that we are leaving for your children, and grandchildren will show the dastardly effects of the winds of change that blew through our lives.  The next door family of Stella and Mary will be much less traumatic than inability of our children to buy a loaf of $10.00 bread or purchase enough of the $20.00 a gallon gas to get to work so they can make the balloon payment on their mortgage.

            I know not where I planned on going with this diatribe.  I know not, even, if this is a worth while expression of my time.  I do hope that I have caused someone to think and maybe they will cause someone to think and maybe they will find a way to redirect some of the winds of change that are blowing through our lives right now.  If something does not change than nothing will change, and I am not sure I like where we are and where we are headed right now.  We need a changing wind, I am not sure we need the winds of change that are storming through our lives right at this moment.

            I have vented. I feel now better. And, now I must go live my life after I finish sipping my morning coffee.  Have a nice day! ?