Afternoon yall, I am celebrating Labor Day doin nooooo labor, not that talkin to yall, my friends and cousins, is labor...but simply that I fully intend to kick back with a good Louis L'amour out at a campground, intend to spend a nice quiet night out on the lake (maybe the fish will actually BITE this time!), intend to eat gooooood! And have generally a mighty fine time....might oughta call it UN-Labor Day! <vbg> But now I got to thinking about that term "labor". Tis something I think on from time to time, when I am mentally exhausted and frustrated with folks in the ivory tower, or my feet have swollen up over my shoes, or the house is a mess or I am complaining about my job, or wishin hard for retirement to be less than a few short years down the road. What REALLY have I got to complain about? Given my ancestors' lives, I reckon not much. I know we all think sometimes that we really would be better off in "the good ole days" and folks I long for them deeply...but fact is, I doubt I am cut out for them. I wish often I had been born in them...but should by some touch of magic I be transported into the past of my ancestors I am doubting I could survive long having been pampered too long. Fact is, I doubt I would even know HOW to survive, and my kinfolk I was transported back into the lives of would be shamed to call me kin. Once they saw what a soft greenhorn their line had evolved into, sheesh! They might even give up on the notion of havin descendents! Consider now... 1) Do you really want to rise before daylight and work till night fall EVERY DAY OF THE YEAR to insure you and your family EAT? SURVIVE? 2) Do I really want to know there is NEVER such a word as "retirement" in my vocabulary and I have to work till the day I die or be beholden and hopeful that one of my youngins will look after me if I became incapacitated? 3) Do I really want to look at that pile of dirty laundry and KNOW I have to a) gather the water to clean it with b) make the soap to scrub it with c) scrub it out by HAND.... 4) Do I really want to have to go out and get wood and a fire started, and stand over a wood stove to even have a cup of coffee in the morning.... 5) Do I really want to do without a qualified doctor and hope that the few things someone might know about the herbs of the forest will keep me and my youngins healthy? 6) Do I really want to have to make the cloth, the thread, and sew each garment my family wears... 7) Do I really want to be dependent on a good shot for game or a good season for crops to determine not only WHAT I eat, but IF I eat? 8) Do I really want literally have no leisure time to hunt up my ancestors? <vbg> Well you see....while I think maybe sometimes (and maybe I think too much) we would all be better off WITHOUT so much leisure time...and maybe integrity of the nation in general would be much stronger if we were closer to the roots of things and had to depend upon ingenuity and hard grunt labor to survive...I reckon I have indeed been "spiled rotten". Reckon I owe my ancestors and yours for the conveniences that made me so. If you are gonna call it "Labor Day" consider THEIR labors that made it possible. Now before I go off campin and "roughin it" <vbg> I think I will hunt up my electric blanket to take along in case it gets cool, microwave a snack to eat on the way, fold my clean sheets out of the dryer to take with us, pour a thermos of coffee from the coffee maker, doublecheck to see that I packed spare light bulbs for my canvas awning lights, and make sure the hot plate is back in the camper... Yall have a dandy UN-Labor day! jan