Postcards from Amerah

Please keep Amerah and her sister in your prayers. These are trying times for the both of them.

She sent this to me today and as always managed to give me a smile and a laugh despite it all...

"Joe gets up at 6 a.m. and fills his cof­feepot with water to pre­pare his morn­ing cof­fee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging lib­eral fought for min­i­mum water-quality stan­dards. With his first swal­low of water, he takes his daily med­ica­tion. His med­ica­tions are safe to take because some stu­pid com­mie lib­eral fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his med­ica­tions are paid for by his employer’s med­ical plan because some lib­eral union work­ers fought their employ­ers for paid med­ical insur­ance — now Joe gets it too.

He pre­pares his morn­ing break­fast, bacon and eggs. Joe’s bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man lib­eral fought for laws to reg­u­late the meat pack­ing industry.

In the morn­ing shower, Joe reaches for his sham­poo. His bot­tle is prop­erly labeled with each ingre­di­ent and its amount in the total con­tents because some cry­baby lib­eral fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks out­side and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some envi­ron­men­tal­ist wacko lib­eral fought for the laws to stop indus­tries from pol­lut­ing our air.

He walks on the government-provided side­walk to sub­way sta­tion for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him con­sid­er­able money in park­ing and trans­porta­tion fees because some fancy-pants lib­eral fought for afford­able pub­lic trans­porta­tion, which gives every­one the oppor­tu­nity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excel­lent pay, med­ical ben­e­fits, retire­ment, paid hol­i­days and vaca­tion because some lazy lib­eral union mem­bers fought and died for these work­ing stan­dards. Joe’s employer pays these stan­dards because Joe’s employer doesn’t want his employ­ees to call the union.

If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unem­ployed, he’ll get a worker com­pen­sa­tion or unem­ploy­ment check because some stu­pid lib­eral didn’t think he should lose his home because of his tem­po­rary misfortune.

It is noon­time and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe’s deposit is fed­er­ally insured by the FSLIC because some god­less lib­eral wanted to pro­tect Joe’s money from unscrupu­lous bankers who ruined the bank­ing sys­tem before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fan­nie Mae-underwritten mort­gage and his below-market fed­eral stu­dent loan because some elit­ist lib­eral decided that Joe and the gov­ern­ment would be bet­ter off if he was edu­cated and earned more money over his life­time. Joe also for­gets that his in addi­tion to his fed­er­ally sub­si­dized stu­dent loans, he attended a state funded university.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the coun­try. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating lib­eral fought for car safety stan­dards to go along with the tax-payer funded roads.

He arrives at his boy­hood home. His was the third gen­er­a­tion to live in the house financed by Farm­ers’ Home Admin­is­tra­tion because bankers didn’t want to make rural loans.

The house didn’t have elec­tric­ity until some big-government lib­eral stuck his nose where it didn’t belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Secu­rity and a union pen­sion because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating lib­eral made sure he could take care of him­self so Joe wouldn’t have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps say­ing that lib­er­als are bad and con­ser­v­a­tives are good. He doesn’t men­tion that the beloved Repub­li­cans have fought against every pro­tec­tion and ben­e­fit Joe enjoys through­out his day.

Joe agrees: “We don’t need those big-government lib­er­als ruin­ing our lives! After all, I’m a self-made man who believes every­one should take care of them­selves, just like I have.”

Janann W. Ransom"


Take care of yourself woman, you know I'm prayin' for you and sister too.

Guest Post

It seems as though I'm not going to post anything. Adrienne contacted me asking if she could write up a post for me to post on here. I wrote her back saying "as long as it pertains to social work' and this is what she wrote. I have to admit I wasn't sure if I would post it and even after reading it I still wasn't sure. Then I read it again. I think I will leave it up for awhile to come back to when I need to be reminded or when I'm having a bad day or I'm feeling particularly cynical. Thanks Adrienne, it's great to see social work from someone else's eyes every now and then.

What Social Work Involves

When you earn a degree in social work, you plan to help those who are less fortunate than you. You have visions about making a huge difference in people’s lives and of them being eternally grateful to you. But, a social worker’s life is nothing spectacular like the movies – you are not a hero or heroine who steals the show. Instead, you are the constant but steady presence in the lives of people who need help and are desperate for it. You may not make their life out of the ordinary, but you sure do much to make it bearable. So if you’re thinking of going in for social work, here’s what the career involves:

* Long hours, long lasting memories: Yes, you may have to work long hours, but the memories you form stay with you for life. Some may not be all that pleasant, but the success stories of people you have helped linger and come back to soothe you when things don’t seem to be going too well. The good times make you stick through the bad ones, no matter how tough things are.
* Grateful people, angry people: You’d be surprised at how grateful people are when you make a positive difference in their lives with your help and encouragement. But that’s only one end of the spectrum. On the other, you have those who take out their anger against the system on you – as far as they’re concerned, you’re the scapegoat who is to blame for all their troubles. So you must be prepared to deal with all kinds of people in the same frame of mind.
* Average salary, above average relationships: The pay’s not much, but the relationships you form with people are truly rich and rewarding. When you bond with your clients, especially when there are children involved, and help them get back on their feet and past their struggling days, you cement a lasting friendship that stands even though you are no longer a regular presence in their lives.
* A sense of satisfaction: And last and most important of all, when you help other people and feel that you are making a difference in their lives, you feel a sense of satisfaction, one that makes you feel good about yourself and what you are doing with your life. It is true that there is more joy in giving than in receiving, because when you give your time and effort to help people as a social worker, you feel yourself being filled with an inner peace and contentment that cannot be bought at any price.

By-line:

This guest article was written by Adrienne Carlson, who regularly writes on the topic of accelerated online degree . Adrienne welcomes your comments and questions at her email address: adrienne.carlson83@yahoo.com