>>> THIS MORNING, THESE THINGS HAPPENED:
1. As I was beginning my second mug of coffee while watching CNN, a gentleman came to my door. About forty years old, well-groomed, and professional in appearance, he explained that his twelve year old son has been very sick and has to go into hospital -- but he's already spent all his money and could I help out?
He explained that he lives about 1.5 miles away, and came to see if I could help. He had walked from the bus stop up the daunting three-block-long hill, and then out the 150 feet of paved path from the end of the street to my door. He fought tears as he told me his story in broken English.
I was heart-broken to have to turn him away. My income barely covers my OWN expenses, and a kind and generous (if somewhat eccentric), man in the USA has paid all my own health costs -- and for many things I lost to the CIA, Drug Mafia, etc. I can and do help people-in-need with small moneys, but this man needs hundreds if not thousands of dollars, something I can't give and my own benefactor cannot take on Mexico's poor.
I wondered if I have been foolish talking about the wealth of my distant relatives -- and that which I hope to make. But one person seeking me out is not a sign of my having raised unfair expectations, although I LIKE that he expected kindness from me.
2. This is the entire conversation I had with a few on Facebook last night -- but then the last three comments were added this morning. You needn't read Shirley's re-print of Naomi Ragen's words to follow the conversation below, but I wanted to provide the entire context:
I was heart-broken to have to turn him away. My income barely covers my OWN expenses, and a kind and generous (if somewhat eccentric), man in the USA has paid all my own health costs -- and for many things I lost to the CIA, Drug Mafia, etc. I can and do help people-in-need with small moneys, but this man needs hundreds if not thousands of dollars, something I can't give and my own benefactor cannot take on Mexico's poor.
I wondered if I have been foolish talking about the wealth of my distant relatives -- and that which I hope to make. But one person seeking me out is not a sign of my having raised unfair expectations, although I LIKE that he expected kindness from me.
The whole thing really set me to thinking and I've lost touch with what I'd planned to do today.
2. This is the entire conversation I had with a few on Facebook last night -- but then the last three comments were added this morning. You needn't read Shirley's re-print of Naomi Ragen's words to follow the conversation below, but I wanted to provide the entire context:
>>> SAD BUT TRUE, Mr. Gross added more at 6:30 PM today -- and I responded:
- Today, these Pillars of the Episcopal Church who gave it about $100 million over last 90 years, defend this and Episcopal seminary at Sewanee only gave up their Confederate Mace (symbol of Episcopal Authority) in 2005. Also, my Kenan family with First Presbyterian Church caused the 1898 Wilmington Insurrection,
- where blacks were murdered, property taken, and blacks deposed from elected office. Today, white Republicans use "the Kenan coup" as proof they can murder blacks like Trayvon Martin and get away from it. I recommend marijuana to relax and less alcohol.
3.
Jesus (Yeshua-bar-Joseph, actually), in Heavenly Disco, mixing the music of heavenly FUNK, has gone nearly deaf -- drowning out all the prayers and petitions of the millions -- or perhaps it is billions.
4.
Sonnet XCIV by William Shakespeare
They that have power to hurt, and will do none,
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow;
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces,
And husband nature's riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others, but stewards of their excellence.
The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,
Though to itself, it only live and die,
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity:
For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow;
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces,
And husband nature's riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others, but stewards of their excellence.
The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,
Though to itself, it only live and die,
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity:
For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.
Scott
.
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