Tragic Chain-Of-Events
Dec 22 '04
The Bottom Line This story pretty much explains itself, so I'm providing no bottom line that might end up being a spoiler.
INTRODUCTION:
I frequently get involved in discussions on various messageboards.
Today, I decided that the best way to make a point was to write a story, and I'm going to share it here as well.
Let me know what you think.
The following--starting with the title and intro--is what I posted:
Tragic Chain-Of-Events
I'm going to share a hypothetical situation with you. Although it's fiction, it resembles, at least in part, various true incidents.
Three weeks after one of the coldest nights of the year when all of the shelters were full--a night when the snow fell quickly and drifted in the blowing wind--the temperature finally rose high enough to melt the snowdrifts, revealing what first looked like a pile of clothing but turned out to be a dead woman.
Under her lifeless body, the bodies of her two young daughters were found.
Apparently, she has been trying to protect them from the elements using her own body.
Had it been only a little more than a year before that they had celebrated Christmas in the two-bedroom house in an older part of town that they had been renting with the option to buy?
The house had a nice back yard with an old tree that held a tire-swing, and there was a sandbox where so many sand castles had been built.
That Christmas past, they had a lovely, little tree in their front room and strings of lights here and there.
Christmas music played in the background, and the air was filled with the pleasant aroma of cookies baking--cookies that had been created by a special Mommy & children team.
They were relatively new to this town, coming here so that the woman could find work after her husband had divorced her and had managed to hide himself so well that it was next-to-impossible to find him in order to get child-support.
The woman could have gone on welfare, but that would have been difficult to get on right away, due to red-tape. Besides, welfare has a way of sucking you in and keeping you there, and she'd always been used to working.
So, she found a job that paid her minimum-wage plus at least some of her health benefits--with those health benefits including her two girls.
She wasn't making a lot, but it would do for now.
Eventually, she hoped to sell Avon on the side or something similar and/or either get promoted or else find a better-paying job somewhere.
But there were others worse off than she was, and she was just happy that she and her children had a roof over their heads in a neighborhood that didn't have a lot of crime.
That Christmas, Santa was good to the kids, giving them three presents apiece, one present to share, and a well-filled stocking apiece.
She was able to get working hours that coincided with the times when her kids were in school--a school that had a wonderful after-school program for any kids needing a place to stay after class was over for the day.
She also had enough to arrange for child-care during those times when she was working and the kids weren't in school.
But that was a long time ago, or so it seemed.
Not long after the weather had warmed up, and the kids were out in the backyard enjoying their sandbox and tire-swing, the woman was told that she would soon be out-of-a-job.
It turned out to be impossible for her to find a job that had the kind of hours where she didn't have to pay for child-care every day.
Paying for child-care would make it so that they couldn't afford to do that and keep paying the required rent on the house.
Perhaps, this woman made a wrong choice in trying to live from the small amount she was able to save while looking for a similar job to the one she had--likely, she did, because she and the girls had to give up living in their house and move into a one-room apartment that had been made from an old motel located in the run-down part of town.
After a crack-raid that took place in the apartment next door--complete with gunfire--the woman decided that she and the kids would be safer living in the park during the day and sleeping in shelters at night.
Of course, the weather was still warm at that time.
By next Christmas, she was hoping to be working again and she and the kids would at least be living in a decent apartment.
Then came the coldest, snowiest winter that area had experienced in years. The shelters where she felt safe filled up in a hurry--and even the less-desirable shelters filled up.
Some nights, they were among the lucky ones to get in. Other nights, they weren't.
That night when they had ended up freezing to death under a snowdrift was one of those nights when they weren't among the lucky ones.
How had they gotten to this place?
Why had she been laid-off from work?
She had been laid-off because there was no work to go to.
The local Box-Mart had gone out of business.
They had ended up losing too much money from a combination of shoplifting and people looking to get rich quick by filing frivolous lawsuits against them--everything from people wanting to collect because the candy they bought there made them gain weight to how someone had committed suicide using a gun bought from their sporting goods department.
When Box-Mart closed, there were people who said, "Good riddance to another greedy corporation!"
Why, after all, shed tears for a bunch of rich people brought to their knees in David-slays-Goliath-style?
The lawsuits and shoplifting caused 25% of all of the Box-Marts (including the one where the lady had been so thankful to be working) to have to close their doors, leaving scores of people suddenly without work.
"Big business is crumbling!" proclaimed people who didn't have a clue. "Good riddance to an evil empire!"
An ambulance arrived on the scene, and the three bodies were taken to the morgue, driving past homes where children played in sandboxes and sang while swinging in tire-swings hanging from sturdy trees.
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AinsleyJo
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Member: Ainsley Jo Phillips
Location: Anderson, Indiana
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About Me:
I'm hosting a write-off: http://www.epinions.com/content_5362983044
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