I’ve been dormant for over a year on my blog posts. Shocking but true. Many might wonder where I was. What was I doing that I couldn’t tap a few computer keys and write a few interesting lines.
Life has a way of tripping you up every once in a while and by tripping you up I mean knocking you down, dragging you along and beating you senseless. At least that has been what life does to me.
It starts out with small things, then in my experience it rolls that snowball into an avalanche that comes crashing down on top of you leaving you breathless and struggling to free yourself from it’s crushing weight.
I won’t go into all the details, but know that I have been trying to dig myself out from under this last avalanche with a plastic teaspoon all while it’s continuing to snow on me. It’s exhausting and to have to sit at a computer keyboard and try to be creative at the same time was just more than my brain cells could accomplish.
So what’s changed? Not much on the "life under an avalanche" side of things, but several friends and people in my life have reminded me of God’s promises and encouraged me to keep scooping away. A recent post by dear friends reminded me that if small children can overcome life threatening surgeries and live through pain and struggles I can’t even fathom, (JL) then I can pull up my big girl panties and get myself back on the planet. Bless the little children, for reminding me I need to be pro-active in my life and get my passions back in order.
"Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
I am passionate about protecting those who can’t protect themselves; children, animals, victims, elderly. It makes no sense to me that in today’s world we aren’t all passionate about these same things.
For instance, why do we allow domestic violence victims to continue to be overlooked in our courts and for judges to hand over their innocent children to the same man who abused them all?
Why do we continue to allow large "animal rescue leagues"
to make millions of dollars on the lies they tell while hiding victimized animals in the back rooms? Why do we continue to allow the elderly to suffer abuse and poor health care and basic living needs?
Why must victims continue to suffer in our failed court systems while criminals get more rights? Why must our veterans continue to be lost victims of a failed health care system? Why? Why? Why?
For most of these it’s the "almighty dollar". Those who have the money and the means often don’t use it to help those who do not. Those who have the money continue to victimize those who can’t afford to fight against these injustices. Our court systems are corrupt,broken and costly, our health care system is a joke, our animal welfare often suffers at hands of those who abuse it, victims are ignored and unheard.
Too often if it doesn’t directly affect us, we chose to pretend we don’t know it exists. I call it the "ostrich syndrome" – hiding our head in the sand. The trouble is the problem is still there and the sand is hard to get out of your ears.
What can we do? We can speak out and speak up! We can pick something that speaks to us, to our passions and fight to right the wrongs. I’m working with my youngest daughter to change Iowa’s child custody laws to keep domestic violence victims and their often abused children safe from the abusers. #SafeChildAct
Whatever your passion, I hope you will write to your legislators, governors, whoever and do whatever you need to do to help those who cannot speak up for themselves. It’s time that we baby boomers showed the world the stuff we are made of! We did great things in our youth, lets go out with a bang! Peace!
Until next time…Toni
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