How many of you have been trapped on a school bus on a field trip hours away from home and had little darlings start singing the Beer on the Wall song?

And you know in your own hearts you would flee the bus if they started with the number 4,000, because it would take way too long to finish.

Four thousand hours of volunteer work over the course of your lifetime is all our leader asks of you. Not so much, eh? Averaged over the course of your lifetime, this is piddle. Unless you're middle aged already and you spent your feckless youth making trouble or money or babies or ... then you might be in for a reality check.

I volunteer in our public school systems every week. I volunteer in our food bank every month, and sometimes weekly. I volunteer to help old people get things done around their houses, get to a doctor, or just get some social time. I volunteer to babysit children so their parents can take care of emergencies, or work, or just take a break. I've volunteered every week for years. I volunteer all the freaking time, and there is no way I'm gonna make those four thousand hours of volunteer work before I drop dead from exhaustion.

Do the math.

-- helen (four@thousand.hours?), March 17, 2002

Answers

Don't worry about it. I never volunteer for anything.

-- (lazy@slack.er), March 17, 2002.

helen, Do the math. From all you activities I bet you volunteer 20 hours a month. That's 240/ year, or 2400 in ten years. You'd more than cover it in 20 years.

-- John (johntl@mtn.org), March 17, 2002.

The vital functions that our tax money is expended on, do not include having the government suggest what we are to do with our discretionary time, thank you very much. Moreover, I'd like to know exactly how many hours our Chief Executive has devoted to volunteer work in his own pathetically pampered life. He has one hell of a nerve.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), March 17, 2002.

John, the "official" volunteer activities -- for public organizations -- only add up to around 1300 hours for the last fifteen years. (Schools are only in session around eight months of the year.) The rest, such as taking care of our neighbors' animals these past few days while they see a new grandbaby, are prolly not what our fearless leader was talking about.

I volunteer in the schools every week simply because the schools badly need help and the gov won't fund extra positions. The gov won't fund paying the current staff very well either. Now the gov wants everyone to volunteer to do lots of hours -- 4,000 hours is 40 hours per week for two years, unpaid -- because they want more stuff done and don't want to fund it.

I want better funding for community improvements a lot more than I want million-dollar-a-pop bombs shot at the mountains of Afganistan.

Dear God, I've fallen left of center!

-- helen (just@a.girl.who.cannot.say.no), March 17, 2002.

Well, certainly you've fallen left of the major media outlets' POV. This drift toward independent thinking will need to be rectified, helen, and soon.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), March 18, 2002.

B-b-but how?

-- helen (oh@my.not.today), March 18, 2002.

Helen--

Be careful on that side of the road. There is alot of gunk on the ground and besides you're facing traffic.

I saw part of a show on PBS the other night. It was one of their "donation specials". Seems like they always have a motivational guru type. Remember in the early 80s it was Leo Buscaglia? (whatever happened to him, did he sweat to death?) In the late 80s it was the "dysfunctional family" guy (forget his name) and then there was Joseph (follow your bliss) Campbell, the Myth-meister.

This time it was Dr Wayne Dyer, the 70s pop-psychologist. I didn't know he was still around. One of his big themes was how important it is for people to give of themselves. The more we give, the more we receive. Not exactly a new idea but one worth repeating. I wish it had not taken me a lifetime to understand this.

His ideas were not wrapped in either religious or political rhetoric. The audience was full of goo-gooey, middle-class PBS whitebreads that dutifully sniffled thru the message.

-- (lars@indy.net), March 18, 2002.

Lars, from what Dyer mentioned several times, the whitebreads gave $400 apiece to hear those words.

The "dysfunctional family" guy was John Bradshaw. Don't know what happened to him. I think Buscaglia is dead. (Never heard of Campbell, but maybe he was on back when I was continuously pregnant or nursing for several years -- think massive nutrient deficiency and near-fatal sleep deprivation. You know what I'm referring to...)

The kids and I watched Dyer and heard his beautiful words. They were nearly meaningless for application to our family. He considers it a "problem with my child" when his kid wanted a prom dress he thought was too expensive -- then he loaned her the money and let her pay it back. Number one, around here a problem with a child involves the court system, and number two, we aren't a bank.

I don't mind volunteering my time, but I resent having the government raise the bar to a number, that I, mega-volunteer, cannot reach. They're doing it so they can suck up more money for "secret" military projects while we make up the slack in the lunchlines at school. I'm probably the dumbest person on this board where politics are concerned, but even I noticed this is a rip off.

-- helen (phd@in.mule.etiquette.though), March 18, 2002.

B-b-but how?

Rest assured, helen. If you place yourself entirely in my hands, I can put a stop to this troublesome habit of thinking for yourself, muy pronto! Just do whatever I say. It'll be a snap!

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), March 18, 2002.

Sounds like mule talk to me. >;(

-- helen (heard@that.one.already), March 18, 2002.

Leo was cool.

-- (living@loving.learning), March 18, 2002.

As a Democrat, believe it or not, I agree with Helen's basic argument. (Also, my own volunteering has been confined to donating blood - I'm pretty good at that. But I'm not about to change my ways because Bush urges me to.)

-- Peter Errington (petere7@starpower.net), March 18, 2002.

the whitebreads gave $400 apiece to hear those words.

Yes, I misspoke when I said "middle class". They were upper middle class, tastee people.

-- (lars@indy.net), March 19, 2002.