I'd Like to Buy the World a (Diet) Coke.

Some would say I just want to give the world a Coke. I say what's wrong with that?

We see so much poverty around us. It's heartbreaking knowing how our elderly are living around us. Here's a little something I want to share…

We awaken to a warm house with coffee already in the pot.

He awakens to a cold hard floor with cracks so wide, he can see the critters beneath who wait for the fire to get going.  He has some instant coffee, occasionally, if he had the money  to buy it.  I'm not sure he has firewood or the wherewithal to get it.

If he did, how does he get it to the house?

If necessary, we would get into our warm truck in the garage and go out a cut some wood. But in reality, we flip a switch and immediately have a fire in the fireplace, to enjoy as we sip that coffee. He could use the truck, to go out and gather some wood for the old wood stove,  but the holes in the floor board are bigger than those in the house…and he has to park it so far from the house and walk quite a distance back to the house. In the rain, snow and mud.

Since his momma died, life has seemed so much harder. She received a little check every month that helped pay the few bills they had, and when that last check hadn't been cashed after her death, he called to ask if they could cash it. Our great government told him he must return it and find his own way to pay those bills and buy the few groceries he would need to survive, along with his mentally disabled sibling who was left behind for him to care for.

They would spend the next several years surviving from the small check the sibling received, all the time avoiding any more government assistance, because he was too proud, yet at the same time, too embarrassed by his slight lisp and stutter, and the fact that he never learned to read, to attempt applying for assistance of any type, including Medicare and SSI.

Our hearts break for this situation and many others that are hidden in the nicks and crannies of our little mountain, but we swell with pride that there are people in the world, however forgotten, who still want to do the right thing and pay their own way.

I don't know what we will do to help them in the future, but as they age, the need is going to be great. Mobility issues will likely leave them stranded, or in a nursing home….except they have no insurance coverage for that. I'm  afraid a Coke is not enough this time.

These are my people.