Friday, August 17, 2007

The Face of the World

I've been away, or rather haven't been away from the entanglements and scheduling conflicts that keep me occupied most of these days. I've moved now; I have a room instead of a house. Less expensive, more boxes of stuff to store.
I just realized that public speaking no longer makes me shake physically. I guess if you do something enough, you eventually get used to it, even if it's something you never thought you'd embrace.
I've been writing more, which is good, but falling behind in my jobs. I now work at 4, count 'em 4, different places.
ITT Technical Institute - full time
Southern California School of Music - part time
UX - part time/contract work
The Princeton Review - on hiatus
What does this show you, friends and neighbors? It's never the fact that you can't get a job. It's how many of them you need before you can pay your bills. Let me stress again that I am single, no children, average student loan debt, average car payment. Is anyone listening in those hallowed halls of Congress? Or is that the point - let's make our citizens work themselves so much to make it that they no longer have time to participate in world events and we can run this country into the ground?
A friend tells me that the rhetoric Bush is spewing out now about Iran is exactly the same as what he said before we invaded Iraq. Please dear God let us know some peace for a time - no more war. Is it so selfish to want this? Will Iraq and Iran and Afghanistan really suffer so much without us? If so, who else can help? Surely if there is so much danger and distress in such a crucial part of the world, other countries would be willing to step in where we leave. Or perhaps we just don't want anyone else there due to the oil interests?
Tangled, tangled. My own life is so complicated. I can't imagine deciding the fate of a nation. It reminds me of the old Groucho Marx axiom - "I don't care to belong to any club that will have me as a member." I've heard the reverse is true of presidents - the only men who want the job are the men you don't want to have the job.
Just as an interesting fact - with the state of our country's homeland security today, the statements I've made can be counted as treason. Just an FYI.