The first day of the last month of the year ...

Being a grownup is hard work. The responsibility of a job places time constraints on how we get things done and I've been lucky to have a boss who tolerates my tardy arrivals when I try to cram too much into the early morning before I leave my house. But, I grow weary of the long commute. When I began working at my current job back in 2005, it took me 25 minutes to get from my house to my office. Today it requires 40 to 45 minutes to make the same journey. That is 7.5 hours per week spent in my car getting back and forth to my job. Or, 16.25 days per year. Insert a sad face here. Why? There are just too many people in southeast Florida where I have lived for the past 41 years. And, the rich developers keep building high rise condominiums priced for the wealthy. Affordable housing? Not in Florida. Not anymore. So, my long commute may well grow longer.

I've always worried about money. I never had enough of it.  As I move closer to retiring from my full time job with benefits, I'm getting butterflies in my stomach. Will my meager retirement income be enough? Will I be able to find part-time and/or free lance work to fill the gap? Will I grow into one of those sad old ladies at the nursing homes whose families have abandoned them because they had to sell everything they owned to be able to qualify for Medicare to get into the nursing home in the first place? Now, THAT is a frightening prospect, for sure. Should I work til I'm 70? What do I really want to do? Why am I so anxious about this?

The current proposed tax bill making its way through the Senate this week scares the bejesus out of me. This could change the way we live in America. I think of "The Hunger Games" and the division of classes and I fear we are hurling toward a time when the rich have everything and the rest of us just survive. I am stunned at how the dynamics of class division is being manipulated in the media today to prevent oppressed groups from joining forces into a united front against the government's actions to rob from the poor and give it all to the rich. Apathy runs rampant. Where do we go to to protest? Our legislators aren't listening to us!

My escape from all these tough issues is, of course, art and fashion dolls. They are way more fun and way less stressful than all that other stuff, but, I cannot ignore what is going on in this tiny life of mine. My struggle to survive is nothing compared to those in Yemen, for example. Yet, a struggle it is at times. I've kept my tongue in my head for a long time now. That's over. I'm writing. Finding these words has been a real effort this morning, but, there they are. My thoughts. My truth. My joys and my fears. Mostly my fears today because the Senate is voting on that fucking tax bill that will make the rich richer and richer. Insert another sad face here and let's call it a day. Time to start decorating for Christmas!

5 Days to the Election: Let's talk money!

As we close in on the final days of the campaign for President, the message from Romney is clear. If we vote for him and he gets elected, he will create 12,000,000 jobs. 12 million jobs.  Yeah.   Right.

However, now that Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc in the northeast, I suspect rebuilding and repairing the areas hardest hit will create at least half of those jobs. What a great "stimulus," huh? And, it didn't take a President to do it! Just some wind and rain!

I have said it before, and I'm going to say it again: It does NOT matter WHO gets elected in November. Not where the economy is concerned. Our economy WILL recover, regardless of who the President is come January 2013. It's already on its way to recovery. It took awhile to screw it up, and it's taken awhile to get it to turn around. But, it's turning. Things ARE changing and the economy IS improving.

What I'm most pissed off about is that it could have been different if it weren't for the hard-headed Republican jerks running around Washington passing themselves off as representatives of the people. That guy, Mitch McConnell? He's the one who said, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."    He said it in an interview prior to the mid-term elections in 2010. He said it because he and his cronies opposed what Obama was trying to do. But, instead of working together to find common ground and realistic solutions to the problems facing the country, he used his leadership skills to do just the opposite. I don't see him representing any people when he does that. I see him pursuing his own interests.

Granted, if you read the interview where the quote originates, you can see that he is speaking in a political context. He makes it clear that the goals of the Republicans couldn't be achieved unless Obama is defeated. What he didn't say, (but, I know this much is true) is that the health care law, often referred to as Obamacare, cannot be overturned if Obama gets another four years.

All the time, energy, money and creativity that have gone into undoing the President could just as easily been spent to fix things, couldn't it? Couldn't it?

Yes. It could.
But, it didn't work that way. And, when I seek to find out why, I keep running into the same crap. That Supreme Court decision that allows "big money" to give to the campaigns. THAT's a big problem. And, it's sure not doing anything to help improve our economy! Think of what that 2 Billion Dollars could've done to help the people! People like my brother who has been unemployed since 2009. All he wants is a job.

I've stopped listening to the commercials. I don't argue on Facebook anymore, either. It's over. I am worried about the outcome, but like everyone else, I'll have to wait to find out what the future holds.