Here we are--just two days before Christmas. At my house, that means making those last minute store runs for all the groceries I’ll need to cook Christmas dinner, plus any little last minute gifts. Tomorrow will be spent getting all the food prepped--baking the pies and putting together the fruit salad, getting the cornbread stuffing ready to go in the oven, and making the dough for the rolls. We’ll also bake and decorate our annual Christmas tree cake--several years ago, I found a tree shaped cake pan at a yard sale for 25 cents, and the cake I made for the kids out of it was such a big hit with them it became a family tradition.
This year, we’re going to have a huge crowd at our house--about 35 people. We decided to invite some of the families from my children’s school because, like so many folks these days, they are having a really hard time financially. Maury County, TN has a lot of very poor people. Some of the kids my children go to school with are lucky if their families can barely keep food on the table, let alone afford to get their kids anything for Christmas. So we invited as many as we could, and bought all the kids a few small gifts each. We couldn’t afford to spend much--I’m not exactly what you would call rich, but it didn’t seem right to allow all those kids to go without anything at all on Christmas Day--in many cases, not even a decent meal. So I sat down and talked with the kids about it, and we agreed that this was the right thing for us to do.
A lot of people I’ve talked to around here think I’m crazy for doing this. They say that there’s no way in hell they would spend $600 buying gifts and cooking a dinner for people outside of their own families. They tell me that the people I’m helping are mostly “lazy-asses” who don’t deserve it, and that they are just taking advantage of me. They think those people must have brought their poverty on themselves--they just assume that these folks must be drug addicts, drunks--you get the drift. This county is Teabagger Hell--while there are folks around who try to help the poor, even many of the ones who are willing to do anything at all to help their down and out neighbors dish out that assistance while looking down their noses at them...
But those people can think whatever they want of me--I believe we all have a moral imperative to help those in need. Over the years, I’ve realized that I’m something of a weirdo to a lot of folks--maybe it has to do with the way I was raised up in eastern Ky. My dad was an old-school liberal, born in 1913. A regular visitor at my house was his life-long friend, old Congressman Carl D. Perkins. In their generation, whole communities would have probably not survived if not for people pulling together and helping each other. Maybe that’s why Carl was so devoted to helping the poor and the disadvantaged--unlike many of our politicians today, he wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was raised poor, on a farm, and had to work just like everybody else. To look at him, you would have never realized he was anybody big and important--when I was a kid, he was just another one of those old men my dad was friends with. I remember the last time I ever saw him alive, just months before his death. He had come to see us right after my aunt, who lived up in Alaska, passed away. We had just had a big flood that spring that had washed out our 500 foot long driveway--but that didn’t stop Carl from coming to check on us. He walked right up our muddy, impossible to drive on road, escorted by two secret service agents, still wearing the suit he had worn in Washington. Unlike some of the preening turds we have in Congress now, he didn’t consider himself too good to get a little mud on his shoes in order to attend to the needs of his constituents. It wasn’t until we attended his funeral at Knott County central High School later that year that I realized how truly important Carl had been.
After I grew up and left home, I realized that many people in this world are not like the ones I was raised around. I always felt like an outsider when people would start talking about politics, or social issues, or even religion. The crap they would spew sounded dead wrong compared to the things I was taught when I was a child. For many years, I would just keep my mouth shut, rather than argue with many of those people. It seemed like the morals and ideals I was raised with were dying out--there weren’t all that many people around who seemed to think like I did. It wasn’t until 2005 that I found a group of people who finally sounded like they were actually half-way sane--and that place was here, on Daily Kos.
I was just randomly surfing the internet, when I stumbled upon this site quite by accident. I don’t remember what I was reading about--just that I kept seeing all these articles that expressed opinions on things like the Iraq War that seemed to jibe with my own. I read things that confirmed my own gut suspicions about people like George Bush and Dick Cheney. I realized, then, that maybe I wasn’t so crazy for having those ideas after all. At first, I just lurked. Then timidly at first, I started commenting and finally wrote my first diary.
In the years I’ve been here, I’ve seen so many folks here go out of their way to help people they have never even met, and probably never will. You don’t run into people like that every day. And then there are people like Jesse LaGreca, aka Ministry of Truth, who has stood at the forefront of the Occupy movement--and people like Una Spencer, who had the courage to get arrested in the name of standing up for what’s right. There are so many people here who keep reminding me of my dad, and his willingness to sacrifice for others. You folks also remind me of Carl, and his dogged determination in standing up for the poor and oppressed of this country. I believe the ideals held by people like them have not died out after all--they live on in the kind of people we have right here. People like all of YOU are what can save this country from becoming a third world hell-hole. Not the politicians, not the business leaders. If we want them to work for the good of ALL the people, we’re going to have to hold their feet to the fire and MAKE them.
I was delighted to have the opportunity to write this diary for the subscription drive. There are so many intelligent, good, and decent people here--I’m honored to even be allowed to comment in the diaries some of you write. I was also quite surprised, and deeply humbled, when I learned that the small donors had pitched in to buy me a lifetime subscription. Lord knows, there are people here who contribute a great deal more to this site than I have been able to--many of whom are dirt poor, suffering from various illnesses, or who hold full-time jobs and have families to take care of, but who still make time to contribute to this community.
So in the spirit of the season, and in the spirit of helping those who have given all of us so much of themselves, let’s try to help a few more of those who are still in need of a lifetime subscription. As everybody should know by now, having a subscription means no ads, making the site run much faster--a real blessing to a person using dial up, or who is stuck with an old computer. Also, subscribers also get access to three new e-books, including “American Taliban” written by Markos himself. From what I can tell so far, it looks to be a very good read. And you will also be able to make use of the new Dkos photo organizer when they roll it out during the first quarter this year. Subscribers will be able to upload photos directly to Daily Kos--in addition, we will be able to use the editorial team’s photo library. No more messing around with Photobucket!
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Now, I’m going to start digging stuff out of the freezer and pantry, and make that store list I’ll need when I go grocery shopping for Christmas dinner in a little while. And let me wish all of you a Merry Christmas (or a Happy Holiday, whichever you prefer).
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