A Culture of Blame

My job puts me in many a strange situation. It was never a job I thought I would have. It's not really the sort of job you think about at any time when someone asks you what you want to be when you grow up.

The thing I want to talk about today is devolution.

I have never in my life seen anyone devolve so totally as I did this week. I saw a grown woman go from being a 30 something to a little child in the space of several minutes.
It was freaky. Seeing someone who has functioned like an adult in every situation you've seen them in, suddenly sit there, rocking, shaking, refusing to open her eyes and crying for her mummy.
In amongst the info dump that happened in those 20 odd minutes where I tried to talk her down, or back to reality, I noticed something. A decided lack of responsibility.
Everyone else was responsible for the position this woman found herself in.

It is so sad that a great number of us have crappy moments in our lives and we just get on with it, but there is an increasing number, it seems, who think everything bad that happens to them is because of what someone else does or did. It's the police's fault that someone goes to jail - it's got nothing to do with the drugs they were on and the actions they took. It's the old person's fault they nearly died because they wouldn't hand over their money and jewellery. And the list goes on.
Me, things don't go as planned well I come up with another plan. I may rant and rave, even throw the occasional pillow but I certainly don't go and commit a crime and blame someone else. Believe me I have had quiet a few downs in my life, more bumps in the road than I would have liked. It can be hard when you know people who always seem to land on their feet. You know the ones - those who squander the amazing opportunities you would give, well not quite anything for, but then they get another and another. You want to slap them upside the head, jump up and down and demand they introduce you to the person who made them the offer because you would like nothing more than to say 'pick me'. It is not to be though, and so we pick ourselves up and go on.
I don't really know where this culture of blame has come from and to be honest I don't know if it's really getting worse or if I just notice it more the older I get.
It is so sad. It makes me want to just take some of these people and shake some sense into them. Unfortunately I'm pretty sure that won't work. No amount of shaking will make a difference till these people want to step up and start acting like adults and taking responsibility. Sure crap happens and it's not always in our control what happens to us but how we respond, that is within our control.

In Brief

If people didn't give into to their baser desires, our children would be much safer. Our innocents, whatever the age would be looked after. Greedy, selfish bastards of either sex, would get their just desserts.
I am lucky and I often forget that. But geez it pisses me off that I live in a world where there is a child sex trade, and human trafficking.
So much for civilization.

Won't Somebody Help Me?

I am a book junkie. On Thursday I bought a new book. I finished it Thursday night. Knew I was going to pay for it Friday morning but I didn’t care, I had to finish it. I did pay, though not how I thought I would. I slept late so I didn’t have time to drag my feet, be grumpy or feel sorry for lack of sleep.

My new job is proving to be a touch dangerous to my ability to balance the household budget, I keep finding new authors to buy. It was different when I wasn’t in this environment, then I was able to stick to authors I knew or where recommended by friends. Now my circle of reading influence has greatly increased and I’m surrounded by books and readers all week.

ARGHHHH! If anyone wants to take pity on this poor addict gift cards or cash will be greatly appreciated. It would be a tragic day if I had to turn to crime to support my habit.

A Lady Died

A woman died the other day. So what you might ask? So what indeed? This woman was an elderly woman and I believe she was living by herself. This woman died, not of natural causes but as a result of someone breaking into her house while she was there. She didn’t die because they beat her or anything (though there is plenty of that going on as well) she simply died from the stress. This is my understanding from the news reports.

This was bound to happen, unfortunately.

On a related topic, someone tried to break into our place the other day. We weren’t home. We think the alarm may have scared them off.

Even if it hadn’t happened to us I’d have still been really annoyed. This is something that has been bugging me a lot. I work hard. When I don’t have a job I work hard on my writing and looking for work. I don’t slack off and I don’t like being reliant on welfare. I sure as hell don’t look at the person down the street, or in the next suburb and think I have a claim on their stuff just because.

Sure there have always been people that way inclined, sadly, but the action so often comes with excuses these days. You know what? I’m sick of them. There simply is no excuse to terrify an old lady to death just because you want what little she has.

Sadly she probably won’t be the last this happens to.