The American Caste System

OBSERVATION: All human beings need someone they feel superior to.

CASE IN POINT: We are having our home painted and I am finding the hierarchy among the painters so intriguing. What we have here is a microcosm of American society today.

We, the home owners, are middle class, college educated, white, mid-western Americans. The owners of the painting company are African American. The manager of the site and his wife are white, but, if I am being politically correct, I would say they are white Americans, short on education, who are undoubtedly low income. I make this observation through appearance, conversation and a lack of good dental health. If I were not being politically correct and were a very offensive person, they would be labeled "white trash". And, the two other two painters are "The Mexicans"- kind, laughing men with little command of the English language. And, thus falls the hiearchy.

Geez... we are all such elitists in our own way. Craig and I have even struggled as to how to refer to the Latino men. They are in fact, Mexican by birth- but being referred to as Mexican in America has become almost a vulgarity. The site managers refer to them as "The Mexicans", they say this in an insulting, looked-down-upon way. They do not allow "The Mexicans" to use our bathroom. We graciously don't expect the paint crew to drive to a convenience store for this human function. They have been outside our house, daily, for a week. Seriously, use our bathroom.

At times the situation seems laughable, but mostly it's really, really sad. Sad, that we as God's children, despise each other so much. I used to find it crazy that my mom grew up in a country (India) with a caste system. A system so stringent that whole groups of people had no hope of rising out of their caste and those on the lower end could only hope for jobs of servitude. I'd like to think we, as Americans, are different, but, of course, we're not.

I know, I know.. this is the way of the world from the beginning of time. Always there will be those on the top and those on the bottom of the social rung. I also know that there is no one among us who does not have their own prejudices. You can be very open to different ethnicities, income levels, nationalities but really look down upon people who are ignorant and uneducated. You can strive for political correctness, but not want to have anything to do with someone who doesn't share your religious or political beliefs. And so on and so on... our prejudices are endless.

In my heart I believe we are all God's children, but in reality, I understand that we humans don't have the capacity to honor this and probably never will. In the meantime, I sit and observe and find humor in the situation at hand and in our primal need for superiority.

VSL

I Think I Am Losing My Mind

Upon hearing that my husband will be working weekdays in another state, a friend told me "Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong while he's gone." Well, it happened today.

I was running late for work, racing around gathering my things when I realized my keys weren't in my purse. My keys are always in my purse. My entire adult life I put my keys in one designated spot. For years I haven't purchased a purse that doesn't have an open outside pocket for depositing my keys.

I didn't panic at first. I knew I'd only left the house once on Sunday to go to the grocery store. Driving home, I noticed my floor mats had a lot of dried leaves on them, so I decided when I got home I'd shake them out before hauling groceries in. I know... how very anal of me, but that's how I roll.

So, I thought, "I bet I left them in the ignition." I don't think I've ever done that but I could see how that might have happened since I altered my usual course to shake the floor mats. Once I discovered they weren't in the ignition I considered the possibility that, keys in hand, I might have dropped them while shaking out the floor mats.

My next step was to look outside in the flower bed where I shook out the floor mats. To make a crummy start to my day even crummier, it was raining. I stepped out in the light rain and searched the flower bed. No keys.

At that point I did the next logical thing- empty out the purse. I didn't count, but I believe I may have searched my purse at least 10 times this morning. Why do we do that? You know the keys are not in there but still check again and again. At this point I was getting nervous. How this might play out started playing in my head. I have no keys, therefore I can't drive to work. The only spare we have is on my husband's key chain and he is in the air heading for his work week in Dallas. Crap!

Recalling I'd been to the store and once again forgotten to use my reusable bags, I considered that the key might have been thrown away with the grocery bags. Okay, I admit, I already have too many plastic bags, so yesterday I put mine in the trash. It made sense that I might have carried the keys in with me and set them on the counter, then set the grocery bags on top. I might have scooped them up with the empty bags and tossed them as well. I did remember that I carefully felt the bags to make sure nothing small was left in them before depositing them in the trash. Despite this recollection, I went through the entire smelly, slimy, disgusting mess. I carried the trash can out to the garage and emptied it out into the garage trash can one stinking thing at a time. By the time I was convinced the keys weren't in there, my hands had coffee grinds and bacon grease on them.

Okay, now what? I could call a co-worker to come get me but that wouldn't solve anything for the rest of the week. I NEED TO FIND MY KEYS! The search was on. I looked everywhere, three, four, five times. I called Craig. He'd just landed. He checked to make sure he hadn't accidentally taken them- nope. I told him everything I'd done after the grocery store and we decided that maybe I'd put them on his truck cover and then headed outside to shake the floor mats.

The problem with this scenario was that he'd run several errands after I'd been to the store, so the keys could be anywhere. I decided to take the dog and walk our street and then on out to the main road where Craig would have turned and sped up. That was the likely spot they would have fallen off. Craig stays on the phone with me. I head out in the heavy drizzle, in my work clothes and follow his cars path- no keys.

At this point I need help. I call my daughter Ali because she lives close by and because she has some flexibility with her job. I lucked out, she was going to work late today and said she'd shower and be over. Ali retraces all my steps, searches my purse, the house, my car and the flower bed.

We then decide to drive Craig's path the previous day, searching for the keys that might have fallen off. In the meantime, Craig is in a strange city looking for a post office to overnight me the spare key. Of course, the fact that it was Columbus day and the post office was closed didn't occur to us. Who the hell gets Columbus day off? Next stop for him was fed-ex. They wouldn't open until noon. Weird...

I call Toyota to ask the cost of replacing a key and a remote- almost $300. I NEED TO FIND MY DAMN KEYS!!! In the middle of the street search, Ali and I pass a new shop we've been meaning to visit. After nearly 3 hours of key hunting, we thought it was only right that we check it out. It was worth it. No, we didn't buy anything but we sure wanted to. It was a nice break.

One last search of our street and Ali took me home. I give up. The spare will arrive tomorrow morning. I'll go in late, figure out how much paid time off I need to take and spend the rest of the day playing catch up. Fortunately it isn't a particularly busy work week for me. If it was, I probably would have gone crazy.

At this point I decide I'm done searching for awhile. I need to log onto my work account and see if there is anything I need to handle. I think I spent maybe 10 minutes working, when I swear I heard a voice in my head that said, "Check the garage trash." So I did. I dug beneath the trash I'd already deposited in there one piece at a time and laying under all of it were my keys.

Lordy! What a wonderful start to my week. This is why we need our spouses home.

And, no, I didn't head to the office. My brain just couldn't have handled it.

VSL