Strength and spirit before, during, and since 9/11. We are America!
Archive for September 11, 2014
How to Promote Spousal Abuse
Here’s a recipe for promoting spousal abuse and other violent personal crimes: Recruit people for sports like football and boxing or induct them into the military. Then spend the entire time you have them training them to fight, attack, do physical harm, and perform other acts of extreme violence. Focus on harming their opponent, who is an enemy to be defeated at all cost. Mold them into fighting machines whose objective is to win.
When you’re successful, don’t be shocked when the violence they’re trained for and live with daily spills into their private lives. If you don’t want that to happen, maybe you should modify the training.
Jury Duty–Duck it?
People keep telling me I’m crazy because I’m sticking by my phone this week, on-call for jury duty. They joke about the excuses they’ve gotten away with to get out of serving and point out that I actually have several very valid reasons. So why don’t I duck the duty?
I’m willing to sit through long, draw-out lawyers’ talks and questionable evidence because that’s what I’d want other rational people to do if I or one of my loved ones were on trial. I fancy myself a caring, reasonable, thoughtful, logical person. That’s who I’d want judging me or mine. If everyone who has those characteristics were to duck jury duty, where does that leave our already-infirm judicial system and the accused people caught up in it?
To me, jury duty is my obligation, both to my society and to those on trial.
Can Compassion be a Game?
Here’s a new game for gamers and the rest of us. It’s a game designed to put more than our console-fingers to work. The idea is “to make our communities safer, kinder, more just, and better places to live.” I’m talking about the Compassion Games. Anyone can participate from anywhere.
For details, including how to join a team, go to http://compassiongames.org.
School Clothes Shopping Idea
School clothes–two more Back-to-School ideas that are earth-friendly: Shop for school clothes made out of organic cotton or hemp. Look for recycled-plastic totes. Shop at thrift stores, which have like-new and even new items people bought then discarded.
[For more easy, money-saving, Eco-friendly tips, download a FREE copy of Green Riches: Help the Earth & Your Budget. Go to www.Smashwords.com/books/ view/7000, choose a format, and download to your computer or e-book device. Or download a free copy from your favorite e-tailer.]
Kids’ Shame; Education’s Friend
A Florida girl was pulled from class and reprimanded for wearing a too-short skirt, violating the school’s dress code. To continue going to class, she was made to change into what her mom calls a “shame suit”: over-sized sweat pants and a bright yellow tee shirt, both saying “Dress Code Violation.” Feeling humiliated, she asked to call her mom, who became as upset as her daughter.
The school claims that this was her choice since she could have taken in-school suspension or had her parents called to bring her more appropriate clothing. The girl claimed no knowledge of those other choices, even though they’re written into the dress code that every student and parent should have read.
I can’t help wondering if there was a fourth choice. In my more permissive high-school-teaching days, I remember watching parents drop off fresh-scrubbed kids dressed in nice outfits. Once on campus, these girls met up with friends. Together, they went to their locker to retrieve “school clothes”–short skirts/shorts, tight/skimpy tops, jeans two sizes too small, etc. And the make-up bag. When they emerged from the bathroom, ready for a day at school, their appearance had drastically changed. The clothes they’d worn to school (and would be put back on–and faces scrubbed–before heading home) spent the day in their lockers.
The fourth option, then, might have been a trip to the girl’s locker and a quick change.
A lesson I’d learned back then, as I vainly tried teaching English to teenaged males with their tongues hanging out and their eyes firmly fixed on what the girls had on display, was that a reasonable dress code is Education’s Friend.
Dali Lama on Talking and Listening
The Dalai Lama has such a clear vision of life. I could use him every Thoughtful Thursday and never run out of his bits of wisdom.
Boooo…Who?
I can’t believe that colleges have come up with new rules to apply to sporting events, including a ban on boo-ing. Young adults attend college. When they were young children, they were taught (I would hope) that boo-ing their opponent was not only rude but emotionally hurtful to those on the receiving end. Now that they’re all but grown up, they need a RULE to force them to respect their fellow human beings? That’s disheartening!
Simple Strategy for Peace in the Mid East
Hey, Mr. President, I have a strategy for you that would bring peace to the Mid East and lessen fears throughout the world. Please get the world leaders working on it.
It’s simple, really. All major nations are skilled in spying and sabotage. Put those skills to work by creating a huge rift between ISIS/ISIL and the rest of Al- Qaeda. Convince each that the other is evil and that God wants them extinguished. Then stand back and let them destroy each other.
Oh, and, one more thing, Mr. President–just talk to the world leaders about this; do NOT try to get Congressional approval or the process will take ten years.
Invisible Workers
IT’S MAGIC! Mail appears and trash disappears. Somehow the electric company knows how much power I use each month. After club or church gatherings, the grounds become clean overnight. Fresh vegetables are abundant at the market. A burger just shows up at the drive-through window or a choice of goodies in the cafeteria cases. Funny, I didn’t see anyone do a thing. It was all done by the “invisible people”—workers we take for granted because they always do their jobs.
This year, expand Labor Day into a life-long habit. Make it a point to watch for the person who delivers mail, reads meters, picks up trash, prepares food in the cafeteria, hands over that burger. Be aware of grounds-keeping individuals and housekeepers at the hotels you stay at. Notice the human being who tends the store’s vegetables. In other words, recognize the workers. Make a special effort to thank them. Let them know that you appreciate the part they play in making your life easier. Feel free to shock them with a compliment. They deserve it.