12:09 a.m. - 2003-12-17
Ups and Downs
Quiet day today dear diary - good thing. This morning I tried to miss my regular bus, but it was late. Yeah, fear of the would-be suitor. He seems to have decided to turn it up a notch too. Oh dear. He usually has a seat right behind the driver, while I usually just go stand by the back door. Partly, that is because there aren't many seats when I get on at the end of the route and I like to leave those empty for people who really need to sit down. That's something I do too much of during the day anyway. Also, it ensures that I don't drowse off, which can happen, especially when it is very cold outside and the bus is really warm. When I got on the bus today, my first reaction was one of relief because he wasn't in his usual place. Then as I was approaching the back door, I realized he had taken the seat just behind the doorway and was watching and smiling as I approached. I just turned and took my usual position at the door, but it rattled me a bit.
Work was steady, I carried out quite a bit of the plan worked out between me and R yesterday. All the problem records are now in her office in a secure cabinet and I've started locking my "desk in a bag" in there too. The library manager wouldn't even acknowledge me until the afternoon, when I had to ask her a technical question. It was apparent when she came in in the morning that she was really angry about something, but that's not our responsibility to deal with. The other contract was grousing about the sloppy paperwork of a lot of the scientists. That's true enough, but it is why we have jobs in essence - a bit of a conundrum. Besides that, the scientists are in the same position we are, where they have too much work for the time they have to invest - and they put in very long days. The result is they push the areas of lesser priority back down the line to people like us. The problem is a lot of "minor" discrepancies can add up to major problems in all aspects of the business, when everyone does the same thing. Often, the tasks put off don't ever get addressed, because everyone else down the line is in the same position. One shouldn't have to beg to do one's job properly, but stockholders and their profits are the drivers of upper management policy sometimes. One of the things our government has done, is brought in legislation that makes those voting members liable if their choices at meeting cause harm in the name of profit. About time.
I thought a lot about my mom's cousin today, but I really don't want to talk about it yet, dear diary. There were times during the day when I was almost overwhelmed by the sadness and the feelings of hope/helplessness that come around such a death. I mentioned yesterday I thought she had just run out of enough emotional energy to fight her illness, but not really why. She was in that sandwich position where she was caring for her mom who seems to be in the early stages of dementia. Her daughter is coping on her own with three small children while her husband is posted overseas. So she was helping there. She spent time with her son. As a single parent/lone bread winner the looming unemployment that would come with a serious illness, must have been a real concern for her. I think she had spent all her resources fulfilling her role of multi-caregiver and didn't have anything to fall back on, physically or financially. She had started dating a very nice man, but instead of being happy for her, a lot of people, including family, were criticising her for being so selfish - didn't she know she had to look after everyone else first? If she had been married to this fellow already, no one would have questioned her right to spend time with him, but she wasn't allowed the same courtesy in developing the relationship to the point where it could have worked. What was left for her needs and who would be there for her? The answer, in too many cases, for women in her position is - no one.
I thought again about the woman who lives in the alley I pass each morning. Was that part of her story too? Don't know. I remember it was at about this time a few years back, that a story and appeal were published in our newspaper about the plight of two pre-teen sisters who had just lost their Mom - a single parent. Reason? The Mom had been fighting active cancer, meaning she hadn't been working and was only receiving $800 a month in financial support for being totally disabled - temporarily. Along about the fall, she realized that not only would the "welfare" not meet her and her childrens' basic needs for food and shelter, it would also mean that her possible last Christmas with her daughters would be very bleak. She wanted them to have some last happy memories of their time with her. Like any good parent, she wanted her daughters to feel included and accepted in the society they found themselves in. So she went off the welfare and got a job, even with her health deteriorating quickly. She didn't survive long enough to even buy the presents she had given her life to earn. The newspaper appeal, just shortly after her death, was for the community to come through materially to make the girls' Christmas the way their Mom had hoped to provide it for them. I bet they would have rather had their Mom. Would it have been too much to ask that our society provide for a little more comfort for families in such deep distress without having to sacrifice one member's life first? In the same newspaper, the big editorial stories then were about "how all corporate and private taxpayers wanted for Christmas was lower taxes" - cut the exorbitant spending on social programs. Uh huh. Same stories right now - cutting funding for poor diabetics' basic supplies so that the taxes won't be so high. Well let's see - Saddam Hussein, the $90 billion dollar (US) man. That doesn't even begin to take into account all the other countries' investment in arms. One book I read a few years back estimated that $3 trillion dollars had been invested in arms by the Middle Eastern countries in a decade, even excluding the expenses Israel has in that area. A lot of that came from foreign governments propping up regimes that supported their access to resources in the Middle East. "I was sick and you cared for me, I was in prison and you visited me". Who said that?
Well the kittens are doing the dance of we want our bedroom so I guess I'd better go tend to our evening ritual. Good night dear diary.
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