Taking Care Of Business…

I wish I had better image of me sitting next to the van reading. I don't, this is the best I can do.

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It's Tuesday and finally were having a meeting at Assist, Inc., is supposed to be a weekly meeting but it seems we've hardly had any meetings last summer and early fall. I don't remember going so long a time between meetings. I know is directly related to funding but still quite frustrating from the standpoint that I am sure there are large populations of folks who can use the services our program provides and when were not meeting I guess the funding is not there. This means roofs aren't being patched, storm windows being replaced and water heaters not being installed and most of all I'm not having a place to go. Let's be honest here I really need my weekly Assist, Inc. meeting to be validated as a person's of value/merit in the community.

I have never been more surprised than the last two years as I tried to literally find things to do with the community to give back. I wish I could say that I was altruistic and I was out in the community trying to benefit my fellow man when in fact I'm trying to benefit good old Mark Smith. It's hard doing and doing good should not be so hard. I have to admit there are days, more days then I would like to admit, that I am mildly excited at the prospect of having to do nothing. I mean it's not like I'm doing nothing it seems like I have something to do all the time even if it's puzzles, my one game on the computer and movies I can pull off the Internet or “stream” as that term is. I sometimes feel like the quote from Chicago's Taking Care Of Business “I love to work at nothing all day”. In fact is getting easier to do this everyday… Work at nothing. I think I've written in the past about how on Monday mornings Dana, my home health staff asks me what I did over the weekend or when I venture down to get my mail and run into other people from the apartment complex and these folks will ask me what I've been up to and more often than not I have to reply “nothing”. Not only is this a small humiliation and minor producer of guilt I also get a little worried that I'm not doing enough at whatever I'm supposed to be doing which I'm sure is, not nothing… That make sense?

I do two things everyday, more or less, I do my blog and most days I told my arm bike. When I'm very lucky I have an event of one sort or another. Today it's Assist and Thursday its coffee in the morning and then bookclub in the afternoon. And some of these days I go to the market, I'm going to the market less now, just trying to conserve money and not spend just to spend. Even if I do shop I find myself gravitating to the computer to shop online even for groceries. In many cases is not only cheaper to shop online but much more convenient having someone drop my order, and off at the door to my apartment.

But sometimes it frightened finding myself dozing off sitting next to my white van pretending to read in the afternoon sun and totally enjoying the heat and the quiet of late fall afternoon and hoping no one will see me working hard at doing nothing all day.