Mar 9, 2009

I love flowers. What's not to love? It' easy to maintain flowers in the spring, but come summer, it will be a real chore. A couple of questions have come up with respect to recent posts. First, Hooterville is a metro area of about a million. e wondered. Someone asked what a thief would do with single yard light? Smash it in the street if history is any indicator. That's where I found the one that was stolen before the current theft. For the most part it is just mindless vandalism by kids. Now on with the show. For the past couple of months we have had a lady come in on Monday's to clean. She is a very nice Mexican-American woman who cleans houses as a profession. She makes twice per hour as I do working in the hardware store. Of course, she works twice as hard and is actually competent. Normally, I race home from lunch with my friends to be sure that I'm here to let her in. Today was no exception with respect to the racing home part, but it was exceptional in that she didn't show up. After a couple of hours it occurred to me to check the voice mail. She had left a message asking that I call her because she was not able to make it and wanted to make an alternative arrangement. When I called her cellphone she told me that she was on her way to Sahuarita, a town 20 or so miles south of Hooterville, to bring identification to her husband, who had been detained by the Border Patrol. He was working in Sahuarita and had no ID on him, and no way to prove that he is an American citizen, which he is. What a pain in the butt, that must be. I'm not sure how you preserve the borders and protect people's rights at the same time. I wouldn't want to have to carry ID at all times, lest I be arrested, but I also get that it has become an unfortunate necessity for people who look like they might be illegals. Americans are demanding border enforcement and this is a byproduct of that effort. If this was happening to white Americans, there would be outrage. I also noticed in the paper today that a new survey shows that about 15% of Americans profess no religion. Of course that means 85% profess a religion. What do you make of that? I think that about half the 85% are lying. For the past Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

9 comments:

Squirrel said...

It would be a drag to have to carry ID everywhere to prove you have a right to be someplace.

I rarely carry ID when out walking, because I have a cell phone on me with the emergency #s in it. I would just lose my ID if I constantly took it out of my wallet and put it in a pocket, especially in summer. The cell phone is harder to lose than a driver's license. Plus it tells time.

a. said...

I always have my ID on me. Benefits of having a purse. Not to diminish the point of your post. At all.

Reya Mellicker said...

Smash it in the street? Of course! You see I am not a vandal so that would never occur to me. Duh.

You're "supposed" to always carry ID here in DC, too, though you're right of course that only people of color ever get called on it.

As for the 85% professing to have a religion, for many I bet it's like having a last name. They're "Christian" because they celebrate Christmas, not because of abiding spiritual connections with the divine. Don't you think?

Steve Reed said...

I think Reya is right. A lot of people rather reflexively say they're one religion or another, but I bet there's little actual practicing going on.

I never carry my ID. You're right -- non-Hispanic white people would be outraged if they were the ones being stopped and harassed.

e said...

I got stopped one time by a law enforcement officer as I was walking my friend's dog for her. This was many years ago. The cop wanted to see ID, to make sure I wasn't "lost."

He apparently did not think a woman with a disability walking a dog in her own neighborhood could find her way home. His response to me when I questioned him was,"Peo-ple like you often can't fend for themselves."

There are a boatload of unjustified assumptions being made there...I looked at him and said, "You know, you should not assume because I walk differently than you do that I can't do other things, including calling 9-11 if I need help."

He actually called in my license to verify it, and all I was doing was walking a damn dog ...

Who gets looked at, questioned, are minorities or those who can be profiled. My white skin did not save me just as a brown skinned or black person's skin often does not save them. It's called discrimination.

Jams said...

During my recent hospital stay, even though I specified "no religion" when being admitted, the "hospital pastor" came to my room. Fortunately, I was leaving as he arrived.

Barbara said...

We solved the problem of letting our Guatemalan cleaning person in by giving her a key. Jake is always ecstatic to see her arrive even if we are not home.

People who are not native-born Americans are forever hassled. They comply with whatever is demanded of them for fear of being deported (even if they are here legally.) It's a sad state of affairs.

mouse (aka kimy) said...

i am outraged....

Unknown said...

Seriously? They can ask for ID because you look Latino? I would be livid if that happened to me. I'm white, and I've never had a request for ID from any government official except for instances where everyone would. I guess I'm naive. I assumed they had to have something like a warrant to check you out.