want VS. plenty

Lately Occupy Wallstreet has been making the news. "I am the 99%..." etc. I understand exactly where these folks are coming from, it seems that corporate greed has taken over and is making the lives of hard working folks just miserable. Then I watched the lunchtime news yesterday. In it, a reporter profiled a young girl from South Africa whose goal it was to get an education so that she could become somebody. The tuition plus uniform was one thousand shillings, or about twelve US dollars. For her this was a sum that could hardly be attained.....it was more than her father made in a year! Fortunately, she was given help so that she could go to school. The girls in this school are given one meal a day and it is the only meal they will eat that day. It was a cup of beans and corn. Every day. No one complained about it, it was their only sustenance. She lived in a tiny tin roof shanty in an area overflowing with others just like it. She only slept there, she said, it provided a haven of sorts from would be rapists who preyed on young girls.

She was only about 15 or 16. She had her whole future ahead of her and was willing to work to rise above the poverty that was her life.

If she had seen or known about these "Occupy" movements, I wonder if she would have partook in them. Or perhaps for her, studying amidst the struggles of her life to better herself was probably a better way out.

I thought about her as I watched the commercials. It's almost Christmas now. Thanksgiving Day this year will be practically non-existent as retailers clamor for your hard earned dollar to have every gadget known to humans. Stores will open at Midnight on Friday. I shuddered. What has happened to the family get-together? Already my adult kids have told me they won't be available to eat with me--they have to be "at work." And I think about that girl in Africa....who has one meal a day ay school. It was eaten with all the other girls...laughing and enjoying what little joy they had.

You see, here in America...we have "plenty," but the disparities make it seem less so. Over the ocean, they have nothing, but to them, the little they have--is enough.

If you are able to, this holiday season think over the purchases you "have to make." The day you "have to make it," and the ones who have missed out on maybe the more important appointment they could have had--being with family. Is it really all that important to have that 42 inch screen TV? Read what is in your heart and make the right choice.