Issues: Aging, retirement alternatives, schools, education, NAIS/organics

This is MY opinion and mine alone!

How can people think it's organic, when the basic premise of organic is not just chemical-free/antibiotic-free/growth hormone-free, but it's a way of life so that you do not deplete the soil nor give people drugs and chemicals that they don't need to survive in a healthy, safe manner. It's why I'm fighting the NAIS rulings they're trying to get passed through. It's interesting that the letters I've gotten back from Gregoire's office (she's the Gov. of WA) says that it is not mandatory IF you are not selling your meat/eggs/etc. If you are, then you need to register your farm and your animals. It pretty much follows that if you do not do this by 2009, you're in hot water. THIS is NOT Voluntary in any way if you HAVE TO do this by a certain date/time. The government is just trying to pull another Homeland Security and the War on Iran type of scam on us again! We've lost so many rights that I think people are so afraid of voicing their concerns because they're worried they'll wind up on the FBI's most wanted list if they complain about the problems with the gov't.

ALL I want is to live a life that's organic, chemical-free and as self-sufficient as I possibly can and do it in an ethical/spiritual manner. That's not so much to ask, but if I have to bend to the Government's will, then it is a huge amount to ask, don't you think so? Paranoid? A little, but after we had the Iranian war (which wasn't really to help the Iranians, but to get the oil/gas), Homeland Security (voted in with the fear that 9/11 would happen again), and other rulings, laws, and amendments shoved down our throats because they attach these things to the laws, ruling,s and amendments to what we do want. What I'm seeing is that we have little or no choice to vote on the rulings, laws and amendments that are piggybacked because if we don't vote for the whole package, we won't get the things we really want and need. It's like we have to vote for the worst of two evils by voting for the bad things, which take away our rights, in order to get the good things, like decent health care for everyone, social security, and other good things that we really do need.

And don't even talk about schools: we have such a high proportion of retired people locally that we can't get a YES vote for a new high school that's up to building codes and the educational programming sucks. The kids cracking brick, bad plumbing, leaks, asbestos, and other major problems because we can't get a YES vote. The majority of the population is retired and don't have kids, so they keep voting NO and not looking at the larger picture, then wonder why Johnny doesn't know how to read as a junior or senior in high school. As you can see by my example, this has been going on for years and it's not just the retired people's fault, but is an ongoing problem. BUT we can stop it, if we try.

I know it won't be too much longer and I'll be a part of that group (I'm 52 now), but you have to look at the larger picture. If kids don't get proper and good educations, the crime rate goes up because those same kids won't be able to get good jobs. The retireds don't look at it like that. I hear them talking in whatever lines they're in, banks, and other places (mall walks, for instance) complaining about money for schools and education. It's why the school costs have gone up so drastically for the parents who do have children: no one wants to vote for school levies, and it's only going to get worse. There's no such thing as FREE public education any longer, if you haven't noticed. My daughters are out of public school at this point being 22 and 23, but I look at what is going to happen...not what is going on now.

Some are new soapbox issues for me, but they're just as important as the rest of the soapbox issues. I would have thought the hippies of the 60's through 80's would be smarter than this, but they've gotten more narrow-minded and have larger tunnel vision than their parents did, and it is more than I would have thought could happen to such a forward-thinking group.

What happened, friends?!?!?!? We're all over 30 now and whom do we trust? Don't you see that we cann't put on blinders now after having stirred up so many things during those turbulent Vietname years? We have to continue to change things, if not for us, then for our children and grandchildren, so that we won't have to depend on them when we need help. We need to have an adequate support system and I highly doubt Social Security is going to be around too much longer--the government can't afford it with their high salaries and we all know they won't take a "pay cut." If we keep our heads in the sand and don't do something about this one particular issue, retirement homes, we'll be left in them to die, as our parents, our grandparents and our other relatives, when we're too ill/disabled to tend to ourselves without killing ourselves out of just being too old. We cannot afford to keep our heads in the sand any longer. We need to do something about our situation NOW before we cannot do anything about it because we're disabled or ill. We cannot pretend we're not getting older by dyeing our hair, getting face (and other) lifts, working out, using tooth whitening toothpaste, using botox and other wrinkle relaxers, etc. However, when it all comes down to it, We ARE ALL GOING TO DIE when it's our time and who knows when that is. How much does it matter if we leave a good looking corpse or not, if you're stuck in one of the charnal houses we call retirement homes.

I don't know of one person who has relatives in a retirement home that knows their parents do not want to be there. Would you? Seeing the elderly in wheel chairs propped outside their rooms, just sitting, doing arts and crafts that don't really challenge their minds and bodies so they stay active. Of course, some of them cannot do it because they've had strokes or are physically unable to do it. My own beloved Grandmother nearly blew herself up when she tried to clean her gas oven and used bug killer instead of oven cleaner...she didn't die then, but fractured her hip which healed, but she kept falling because of her meds, and then broke her hip again and she died shortly thereafter at 98 yo. She wanted nothing more than to move back home because she hated living there...and this was a really "nice" retirement community, but it still wasn't home...and no one wanted to fork out the cash so she could stay at home either, or stay with her themselves. Way too selfish to do that after all her years of helping everyone else.

I see it and it's frightening to me and no one is listening because their heads are in the sand hoping it won't be that way. Personally, I hope it happens quickly with no lingering illness so I won't have to worry about retirement homes, but there are no guarantees in thsi life. We need to be looking at retirement home alternatives, which is another soapbox issue, I'll write about on another day. We ALL have to start thinking about these things or we'll NEVER have it any better when we get old enough and really need a place.

We trained our kids to be selfish--think of yourself first, take what you need, a dog-eat-dog mentality, everything else will take care of itself. Whom do we blame when we need someone to help us and there's no one around? Many of us taught them not to have limits or boundaries, and they don't... What does that say about how they will care for us in our old age? This is not the past any longer and we don't have large families to help us in our old age, nor do they want to care for us in our old age. Let's just put Gramma and Grampa into a retirement home until they die. Sounds like great fun, doesn't it? We've created a group of pampered, spoiled children who only think about themselves because that is what we taught them.

The main thing is this: We need to start looking for retirement alternatives so we are not stuck in a place we do not want to be when we can no longer take care of ourselves.