Watching the Sun Rise

I don't normally quote from the Bible, but as I wrote today's post, this part of a verse came to mind: "Inashmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me" - Matthew 25:40

I sit here watching the sky turn from dark to light, wondering what I am doing up so early on a Sunday morning. The stress of waiting to see what Congress is going to do with the budget (among other things) has me wiped out by early evening. At least I’ve been sleeping through the night the last couple of nights, instead of waking up halfway through and tossing and turning the rest of the night.

The last time we had a furlough, I was the lone admin person (out of five) that was left working. And all of us got paid. This time, if a furlough had been implemented, all the employees graded GS-9 or below (non-excepted employees) would have been sent home, and there was no guarantee of back-pay.

Last time, I was the one raising three children on a GS-4 salary. This time, I watched our support staff, many of them raising children, some of them single parents, get the news late Friday afternoon that they would be the ones not coming into work beyond a few hours on Monday. Remembering how tight money was when I was there, my heart broke for them.

I was also watching most folks take either the ostrich sticking its head in the sand approach or the Pollyanna approach, neither way really believing that Congress would allow the Government to shut down. As the eleventh hour approached – as Wednesday, then Thursday, then the end of the work day Friday passed – and watching the rhetoric being thrown about and the verbiage of the bills being introduced, it became clear that this was a clear and present threat to the financial well-being of nearly 800,000 Federal workers across the country.

A clear and present threat cause by men and women in the ivory tower called Capitol Hill back in Washington DC. People who either have never lived on the razor’s edge financially, or who have been away from it so long they have truly forgotten the hollow feeling when you cannot pay your bills or feed your children.

And no, the working stiffs in these financially precarious positions do no choose to be there – these economic times have made it very difficult for folks to find work, plain and simple.

Congressmen and women and Senators, I beseech you – do your job, pass the budget, but do so with care and thoughtfulness on how your actions affect the least of us in this once great nation – the children, the poor, the elderly – those with less of a voice than others.

The elders are our past, the children our future – would you jeopardize either for the fleeting glory of the present?