Ramblings of an Old Man: America What Happened Here?

America is all about money. Don’t let anyone fool you. ‘The land of the free and the home of the brave,’ has become a place where vultures wait to take from you and economically, for the average person, it is getting harder and harder to make ends meet.

I am semi-retired and for many years worked 2 jobs. Over the last few months, I have forced myself to return to work to make more money to pay mounting medical bills and get back into the world. Recuperating from and treating a chronic illness, I have taken this step.  Probably I would be better off physically/mentally, finding healing, fun activities to fill my hours. Joining a gym, going to a day spa or taking recreational day trips, but necessity requires that I return to work, to keep the financial ‘boat afloat.’  Of course, one needs money to pay for these recreational activities as well; just ask any retired or disabled person.

What happened here? Perhaps, it was always like this and I didn’t realize it. During the American Revolution, wasn’t the Boston Tea Party about an excessive tax on the production of tea? Basically, King George wanted too much of what people earned and the colonists got tired of paying taxes and they revolted. At least, that’s the way the story gets told in American history class. I wonder, isn’t this year’s Presidential Election, on many levels, about the economy and how we want our resources spent?

Most people forget, in the Cosmic Wheel, America represents the spiritual opportunity of Freedom; a land or place where you can become whatever you would like. Now, we all realize, this spiritual opportunity must be grounded in the physical world, and much attention must be paid to working, physically taking care of self while learning to reach upward to create our own, individual destiny.

Each day, more and more, I must fend off the vultures that are attacking and grabbing at my income. Just last night, I got a special delivery packet from my medical insurance carrier concerning changes to my prescription coverage; they are converting to Medicare Part D coverage, further watering down what I worked so hard to insure.

Yes, people plotting, waiting and taking bites at me; my soul cries out: Don’t forget the Dream. Remember, ‘America is freedom to do and become; this spirit lives on . . .’

Perhaps, for the average person America exists only as a spiritual Dream, a potential, no longer an actual, physical concrete reality?  Certainly I hope not. In the history of humanity, this opportunity to collectively reach higher has rarely come along.

-SB