When my grandfather grew old, he became what we then called senile. He couldn't remember current events or people, but he could clearly recall events and people from his childhood and youth. When my father grew old, he wrote his memories of childhood in Wichita, Kansas during the 1920s. His details were clear and crisp and very informative. He never lost any of his mental facilities but his fondness for the world of his youth was clear. This world we live in now was not the world he remembered or liked to think about. The world was moving at a faster pace than he cared to go.
Now that I have reached retirement age, I find myself thinking more often about the world of my youth and the friends that I have left behind. It seemed that the world of my youth was slower paced and the flavor of life was sweeter and simpler. Now I find that friends of my youth are facing the ravages of age and some are dying and I feel my time slipping away. I see earlier generations fading from memory and my generation, which I always thought of as young, now becoming the elder generation. I know that this is the way of life, but I still feel young in my mind and I find that life is so sweet and so short. I wish that I could have held on to all those great friends of my youth. We had a special bond that held us together and we looked forward anxiously to the benefits of being in complete control of our lives as we became full fledged adults. Those days were just the other day in my memory and are clear and sweet
.
To those friends from my youth, I wish to say that you helped make my memories very dear and you helped mold me into the man I am now. Thank you all.
Thursday, October 26, 2006
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Saturday October 21, 2006 "cut and run"
From the headlines today:
Calling the Democrats the party of "cut and run," Bush said voters need to ask: "Which political party has a strategy for victory in this war on terror?'"
This kind of rhetoric flows from a flawed logic. Somehow the war in Iraq has become a “war on terror”, which has never been proved and more and more shows itself to have been an error in judgement.
Our president cannot admit to making ANY mistakes and therefore will not admit that starting this war and invading this country was WRONG. No matter how many lives are lost and no matter how much money and resources it takes, he will not allow himself to admit that he was wrong. This is not the type of person who should be head of the most powerful nation on this planet. We need a LEADER who will attempt to make wise decisions, admit when a decision is wrong, and proceed to correct it. We would follow someone like that. We don't need stubborn, bull-headed, dogged, stuff-it-down-your-throat leadership. Here is a man who pulled strings and avoided war when he was young and now has sent thousands of young men to their death for an error in judgement. When we leave Iraq, their civil war will escalate and they will have their islamic state, whether Sunni or Shiite, and we will be a bad memory to them. They don't want us there, some never did. Others are regretting this war and all the upheaval that has followed. They will be glad when we are gone. They have no intention of ever becoming anything but a religious islamic state. Democracy is not part of their heritage or their basic philosophy. They want to be ruled by a theocracy and once we leave, they will be.
Calling the Democrats the party of "cut and run," Bush said voters need to ask: "Which political party has a strategy for victory in this war on terror?'"
This kind of rhetoric flows from a flawed logic. Somehow the war in Iraq has become a “war on terror”, which has never been proved and more and more shows itself to have been an error in judgement.
Our president cannot admit to making ANY mistakes and therefore will not admit that starting this war and invading this country was WRONG. No matter how many lives are lost and no matter how much money and resources it takes, he will not allow himself to admit that he was wrong. This is not the type of person who should be head of the most powerful nation on this planet. We need a LEADER who will attempt to make wise decisions, admit when a decision is wrong, and proceed to correct it. We would follow someone like that. We don't need stubborn, bull-headed, dogged, stuff-it-down-your-throat leadership. Here is a man who pulled strings and avoided war when he was young and now has sent thousands of young men to their death for an error in judgement. When we leave Iraq, their civil war will escalate and they will have their islamic state, whether Sunni or Shiite, and we will be a bad memory to them. They don't want us there, some never did. Others are regretting this war and all the upheaval that has followed. They will be glad when we are gone. They have no intention of ever becoming anything but a religious islamic state. Democracy is not part of their heritage or their basic philosophy. They want to be ruled by a theocracy and once we leave, they will be.
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Saturday October 7, 2006 Chagrin
Am I chagrined?
I didn't know that anyone was actually reading my blatherings. I thought I was writing my thoughts as they occurred for my daughters to read someday and get to know the real me as shown by these writings. One of my favorite relatives from Minnesota stopped by the other day and said how she usually checked on my blog to see what was happening in my world. It was a surprise to me that anyone was checking in on me.
I apologize to any of you secret and very quiet readers that I have been remiss in writing over these last few months. Everything has been smooth and orderly for a while and I have had no complaints. My daughter and grandson visited with my for 3 weeks earlier in the summer and I have had the house insides being repainted – ceilings and walls over the month of September. The house should be almost like new in another month or so. I am having large murals put on the entry wall and one of the living room walls. These murals are of woodland scenes and should bring a lot of depth and color to the house. At the same time I am having the bathrooms retiled and repainted so they will seem much newer. It's been a mess around here while this was all being done. Furniture was moved from one area to another and everything stripped off the walls. I'm not sure where everything was put, but I'm sure it will all show up someday.
Meanwhile, I still have the same feelings and thoughts regarding our world.
I truly believe that we are all in this together and that we all need to look out for each other. It shouldn't be every man for himself. It should be all for one and one for all. If this makes me a liberal, then I am proud to be one. I believe that we have established and ordained our own government to help us watch out for each other and to help us keep order and to protect ourselves. When the government acts against our will and acts to help special interests against the greater good, it needs to be changed. I believe that we need our government to help us with our education, our health and welfare and our protection. If we have a healthy, educated population it will help us all live better lives. If only the rich can afford the good education and the healthcare that all people need, then our government is failing to fulfill one of it's basic purposes. Of course, it needs to regulate and oversee many aspects of our society to keep the cheaters from taking advantage of the rest of us, but it shouldn't be helping them.
Right now, it seems to me that special interests (especially the larger corporate interests) control our government and we are losing out. The rich are getting richer and the middle and poorer classes are losing out. The longer this take place, the harder it will be to correct. Hopefully, it won't take a major catastrophe to awaken the people and change what's been happening.
I didn't know that anyone was actually reading my blatherings. I thought I was writing my thoughts as they occurred for my daughters to read someday and get to know the real me as shown by these writings. One of my favorite relatives from Minnesota stopped by the other day and said how she usually checked on my blog to see what was happening in my world. It was a surprise to me that anyone was checking in on me.
I apologize to any of you secret and very quiet readers that I have been remiss in writing over these last few months. Everything has been smooth and orderly for a while and I have had no complaints. My daughter and grandson visited with my for 3 weeks earlier in the summer and I have had the house insides being repainted – ceilings and walls over the month of September. The house should be almost like new in another month or so. I am having large murals put on the entry wall and one of the living room walls. These murals are of woodland scenes and should bring a lot of depth and color to the house. At the same time I am having the bathrooms retiled and repainted so they will seem much newer. It's been a mess around here while this was all being done. Furniture was moved from one area to another and everything stripped off the walls. I'm not sure where everything was put, but I'm sure it will all show up someday.
Meanwhile, I still have the same feelings and thoughts regarding our world.
I truly believe that we are all in this together and that we all need to look out for each other. It shouldn't be every man for himself. It should be all for one and one for all. If this makes me a liberal, then I am proud to be one. I believe that we have established and ordained our own government to help us watch out for each other and to help us keep order and to protect ourselves. When the government acts against our will and acts to help special interests against the greater good, it needs to be changed. I believe that we need our government to help us with our education, our health and welfare and our protection. If we have a healthy, educated population it will help us all live better lives. If only the rich can afford the good education and the healthcare that all people need, then our government is failing to fulfill one of it's basic purposes. Of course, it needs to regulate and oversee many aspects of our society to keep the cheaters from taking advantage of the rest of us, but it shouldn't be helping them.
Right now, it seems to me that special interests (especially the larger corporate interests) control our government and we are losing out. The rich are getting richer and the middle and poorer classes are losing out. The longer this take place, the harder it will be to correct. Hopefully, it won't take a major catastrophe to awaken the people and change what's been happening.
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