OK, the second in one day - something is going on!
I wanted to do a blog on perspective. Life and our evaluation of it is based a LOT on perspective. I got a great example of this yesterday.
My wife is disabled!! Officially. Perspective - - -
On face value, that would not appear to be a good thing. Disability is not to be cheered. Ah, official disability is (or can be). My seventeen year old was here yesterday when my wife opened the letter and we were cheering for disability. She made a comment that is was weird that we were happy with Mom being disabled. I explained we weren't, but...
My wife's condition is affected not one bit by what the doctors, bureaucrats, or anyone else labels it. She is no more nor no less disabled or ill than prior to getting the letter. However, getting the letter signifies official legal acceptance of her disability. That will hopefully lead to a lessening of the financial burdens of her condition and let us deal exclusively with the physical ones.
I think I mentioned before how during the diagnosis stage, my wife and I found ourselves cheering and wishing for a diagnosis of MS or Parkinson's. Not to say both of those diseases are not horrific and life changing in their own right, but... Perspective - - -
The other diagnosis we were faced with was of a magnitude worse -MSA. I wrote a blog a while back about the alphabet diseases. The addition of an "A" to "M" and "S" takes a horrible disease and makes it imminently more horrible.
In our discussions about disease and disability my wife commented on her possibility of having MS and/or Parkinson's. I said "I know I was pulling for you to have one of them as well." That caused another comment from my daughter about how we were weird. I had to explain to her it is all about perspective.
Let's have a round of applause for my wife's official disability. From anyone else's perspective that may sound strange. From here it is receiving a standing ovation.
Here is another thing that is bothering me - I am tired of people whining about gas prices. Gas was never free!! When people whine about "$40 to fill my tank" they forget that even at $2 a gallon it was $25 or so to fill it!! Here are some numbers: The average car in the U.S. is driven about 12,000 miles a year. If you get 20 MPG (hey if you are driving a Hummer, getting 10, I don't want to hear it!) That is 600 gallons of gas a year. Most people would be estatic if gas was at $2 a gallon again -SO, that is about $600 a year (for the extra $1 a gallon) or $11.54 a week. Now I know there are a LOT of folks that were struggling to pay the $2, but the average person I know was not. Here is another way to look at it. How many Starbuck's coffees or lattes have you had lately at $$37.33 a gallon? ($3.50 for a 12 oz one) How about a beer on an airplane at $53.33 a gallon? ($5 per) Then there is bottled water at $10.66 a gallon. ($1 a 12oz bottle -and it can be MUCH higher...
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