Mowing the lawn thoughts

While doing something that requires very little brain power the mind tends to wander towards bigger and better things... for me that is the issues facing our country. Go figure.

It has occurred to me recently that the challenge facing our country is NOT our elected leaders, it is our own self centered attitudes towards all things. We have become a people that tend to believe that everything is 'somebody elses problem". In the writings of Douglas Adams he referred to this as the SEP. It scares me how much satire can predict real life.

Lets take a very simple problem (remember, this came to me while cutting my grass) of people who don't clean up their grass and just blow it into the street. So then the rain comes and carries it down the gutter into the storm drain. Out of site, out of mind. Now what happens? It decomposes, very, very slowly... meanwhile the people continue to do the same old thing, not understanding the ramifications of such a minor issue, until the HOA has to spend $10,000 to clean out the drain. Then their dues go up and they complain. Such a simple problem to solve and save money for everyone, yet it is an SEP to those who blow their grass into the road.

This is a simple example of so many things that have gone by the wayside. The other day I was leaving Panera Bread with coffee for my wife (yeap! going to be a good husband and suprise her with coffee and a scone!) and a young 'lady' is leaving right in front of me. I think either a) she will hold the door for me or b) I can at least scoot out the door with my hands full. Neither occurs and I end up with spilled coffee on me, the floor, my shoes. The young 'lady'... does not even look back but moves even faster away from the scene of my minor carnage. Panera gave me a new cup of coffee, but none of this would have occured had that young 'lady' taken 15 seconds to just hold the door open. This was an SEP for her.

Give me your examples of SEP's. I'm sure there are many. These are just two that have occured in the past week to me. Perhaps if we start to bring attention to them people will begin to wake up out of their zombie like state and start to think and take responsibility for what happens around them, and what the effects of what they do can have on others.

-End of Ramble