Saturday Morning

It’s been a sad week — on top of the suicide of a young man in our community, and the sadness in David’s family of the failed relationship, a mentally ill man was shot to death by the police in Concord.  It’s not clear what happened, but with the changes happening in the public mental health system because of state budget cuts, there very well may be more events like this.  I can’t get used to how little people with no voice count, how easily they’re pushed aside in debates about funding and revenue and the trashing of budgets to take away the social safety net.  “It’s not a safety net,” a member of NH’s House Finance Committee said to our Commissioner of Health and Human Services at a recent meeting.  “It’s a hammock.  These people are swinging in hammocks and they need to get up and get to work.”  Sad.

Then David got the cold I had this week and was too sick and infectious to come with me to visit Adrienne and Matt and Emilio.  So I spent a bit of time being pouty and upset that here is yet another weekend David and I spend apart.  And then I got real.  We are both alive, we are healthy (except for our colds), we have smart, strong, healthy and highly functional children, and in three months we are going to have oceans of time spreading out around us in all directions (knock wood).  We’ll go kayaking.