EdgeofGloria

I saw a story posted by someone on Facebook about a young boy who raised money to pay for his grandmother's funeral. Here it is: 8 year old Michael Diamond of Ohio lost his grandmother recently. He overheard his parents talking about how they couldn't afford a proper burial, so last Thursday, he decided to help out by setting up a stand selling Kool-Aid to raise money for his grandmother's funeral.  He only sold $55 worth on the first day, but the local news found out about it and did story on Michael. The next day, tons of people came out to buy Kool-Aid! Some people paid $100 a cup. By Monday, he had raised over $5,500! Enough to give his grandmother a decent service.  One boy with a simple selfless plan + lots of generous people = inspiration and respect!  # amazing ! While this is a heartwarming story, I see a couple things that bother me. The cost of funeral expenses, and the effort of setting up a Kool-Aid stand. Something seems pathetic and sad about selling Kool

Every so often, I encounter people who fly off the handle when I point something out to them. It happened in 2005, and it just happened again. My former computer guy was on the news recently, saying he's moving out of the south side because the crime is so bad. I don't think the entire south side is bad, just certain pockets. I said perhaps he was protesting too much, and he went bananas. I wrote another response, and asked him if he'd checked out the neighborhood and the potential neighbors before moving in. He called me a piece of garbage and hoped I got robbed and said the reason I never had kids was because I had bad hair. He compared it to Medusa. I wish I could have said that was original, but he was about 35 years too late with that insult. No "yes, I checked out the neighborhood", or "no, I didn't." By his response, I think it's safe to say he didn't check out the neighborhood. I don't know what he paid for rent, but I'm t

It's a pretty harsh title I've chosen for this post, but if you're a single childless woman, you know how it is. I swear, if I ever win the lottery, or my writing takes off, or I become incredibly successful, I'm going to start an organization called Single Women in Need, or something like that. And it's going to be geared towards women who are single and childless. Because if you've tried to get help from any sort of agency at all, you've probably been turned down. I had to have surgery. The hospital called shortly after I got home to see if I was eligible for Medicaid. Of course I wasn't. I don't have kids. I have a small 401K. If you're single, what sort of bills do you have? You aren't spending money on kids, you must be rich! I resent that sort of thinking. I work three jobs. Eventually, I just want to have one good paying job, but for now, I live a sort of piecemeal existence, relying on the scheduling of my retail job to get me eno

Okay, so about a week ago I said I was two weeks away from bing cherries. Well, I bought some yesterday. I had some today. And they are wonderful. I went looking on the web for right hemicolectomy recovery. A site based in London advised eating fresh fruit, while on my discharge papers, it said to stick to a low-fiber diet in order to give my colon a chance to heal. I wonder if here in the states, we are lied to. Everything here seems different from the rest of the world in terms of healthcare, education, food, lifestyle. I sort of see my surgery as a way to start over again. Maybe the polyp was due to my eating. Maybe it wasn't. There are people who practice a way healthier lifestyle than I do who wind up with cancer. For a long time, I had the urge that I should eat better, that I should stop eating like a kid. My appetite is still down. But my weight hasn't really dropped. I've struggled with depression. I think it's been a little worse that I'm recovering