Thursday, December 06, 2007

Self reliance and all of us...

Wayne Hill says to me, "I think we all have become spoiled and forgotten how to do things, to take care of ourselves." Larry Henson quips to me about something Bill Holt told him years ago.... "Larry, people will do anything they want as long as it takes only the effort necessary to push one button."

I look at our little group, introspectively, and wonder where I fit in? Maybe there are things we can do for ourselves that will improve things for everyone... Little things, things that maybe we take for granted? The library we have comes to mind.. Who puts those tons of books away that we see all the time? It once was Cleda Hampton for 7 years and then Marian Rogers and now I see the Dudley's doing it.

Why do we want these folks to clean up after us? One reason might be that some folks simply do not know how to put books away in alphabetical order or that they visited a public library and saw there always was someone to do that for them. Not thinking that someone has to take a lot of time filing books that they took and read.

Here is a small opportunity for me to take care of my own mess and help our volunteers. From now on when I bring books back to the library I will be putting them back on the shelf, alphabetically, all by myself.

What other opportunities are there? When we have our great dinners at the clubhouse someone has to clean up... A lot of you fold up your tents and break for the door. A few can spend a lot of time serving and cleaning or a whole army of well fed residents can lend a hand and be done with the chore in minutes.

If you are moving or coming into the park you suddenly find you have gobs of books or movies or whatever and you think I'll just take them to the clubhouse and leave them there.. Someone will do something with them.. Call the Social Club President first won't you.. The Club house can only hold so much and then the problem with what to do with your stuff becomes a problem for someone else and takes their time...

Look at what you are about to task others with and ask yourself if it isn't something you can handle... If you answer "no", then we have a lot of fine volunteers that can help... If the answer is "yes", won't you join me in making the extra effort to get it done yourself?

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