Sunday, March 7, 2010

Youngstown

Something that is always in the back of my mind. It isn't just Youngstown, Ohio or any particular town in Ohio. It's the region. Bring up the histories of the places around here to people born and raised and you get a touch of anger. Not at the history. But towards me. I'm not an Ohioan and digging up ghosts here means walking on thin ice.

Folks here work hard and play hard. They find themselves on their feet, working 10 hours a day, by the time they can drive. This isn't something that happened 50 years ago in some history book. It happens now. I see it with people I work with. Women: Foot surgeries at age 50. Men in their 40s broken, at home, with a multitude of health problems from 20 odd years of hard labor. People passing away at age 43 of "natural causes" (happened last week to a friend of a friend). I could go on.

I'm posting a video of a story which is similar to so many that I hear. If you know me out here and you find yourself telling a story like this to me you will quickly realize that you have my undivided attention. I have learned not to ask, but to listen. Your story is America. The America that makes everything work because you work for a living.

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