Reality Check

     It is 2012.  We are ever so slowly climbing out of this time that they call a recession.  Other than the effects of prices on food and gas we have remained relatively unphased by this time in history {PTL}.  I mean, I voluntarily left a good job with a good company in the midst of the recession to start my own in-home daycare.  More than words can ever express how I am grateful for that job and the people that I worked with.  But this post really has very little to do with that.  I have always lived in a suburb.  A sheltered life from all the violence and poverty that we only see on the news.  Believe that I know that it exists.  I remember being in Atlanta and at each exit from the interstate there would be a panhandler.  It wasn't until the recession hit that I saw that firsthand just down the street.  But was given a fresh reminder the other day that there is still great poverty and homelessness.  Public libraries serve as daytime shelters for the homeless.  Usually I take the kids to the library on a weeknight, but this time we went on a weekend day.  We didn't notice anything out of the ordinary in the library.  It was when we were driving out that I noticed at least two vehicles where people obviously were living in them.  All of their possessions were stacked high in them.  Immediately I was thrown back into the reality of the sheltered, blessed life I live.  My heart hurt for these people that I didn't know.  Now I am left with ideas swarming in my head of how I can help.  I can't change it all, but every little bit does help.