What I Learned Today at 38

•        Don’t assume if you are unemployed and unable to find work where you live that you will qualify for public assistance. It doesn’t matter the number of applications or interviews you have completed!

• ·         Education is not a priority in this country or attending college wouldn’t disqualify you from public assistance.

• ·         A complete understanding of why some people are unable to get off of public assistance and why it becomes generational. Also an understanding that the government is the cause of this.

• ·        Getting help to pay your electric bill from the county can cause a lean against your house if you own it (but nothing happens if you rent it.) Realizing I would rather just be without electricity.

• ·         Realizing that people should do everything in their power to become completely separate from the government, utilities, grocery stores, big box stores, products from China, oil companies, debt, credit cards, war, processed food, GMOs, hate, and pesticides. Realizing that people should do everything in their power to smile at people, be friendly, build community, buy from local farmers even if costs more, take walks, and look for ways to help people without them having to ask.

• ·         Anger is the best catalyst for change.

• ·         A bike ride can relieve stress.

• ·         A garden can save your life in more ways than one.

• ·         Giving to neighbors can help ease the worry of your own problems.

• ·         Bacon is a great comfort food.

• ·         When you have money, everyone is your friend. This includes the bank, the electric company, your acquaintances, some family members, etc. When you have nothing, a few are all that are still standing.

• ·         An understanding that things have often happened in my life in which I could only depend on myself for support. (This has been both a help and a hindrance. Today was just one more day that has contributed to slowly transforming me into someone that is fiercely and overly independent.) 
  

• ·         Confirmation that the government wants us to be uneducated, dependent, unthinking, hateful, unemployed, and in debt.

•        A revelation of the rarity of kindness. (My cousin’s husband recently passed away at a very young age. He left behind a wife and three small children. He was a man of God who gave his all in helping others. He made me think of an old song that said that "there are angels among us." His funeral helped me to see just how many people whose lives he had touched. The recent events in my life have made me see just how rare it is to have known someone like him. Thank you Jake for giving of yourself even after you have gone!)