For Betty:

Bet the Tribeca.

S.

-----Original Message-----
From: I. S. Margolis [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Sunday, May 07, 2000 2:43 PM
To: P
Subject: RE: IF ELIAN GONZALES WERE JEWISH

1) Life isn't fair.
2) Struggle is all.
3) In the end, everything is wasted.
4) Sometimes things are funny because they're not.
5) If you want, ask.  Be ready for what you get.

D,

Either I haven't paid close attention to your posts, or am more than
usually forgetful--too likely both.

I suppose being a parent means a lifetime of supposedly voluntary
servitude with whatever random joys and more angst than an unsuspecting
human could anticipate.
If you are parenting a disabled child than my heart and handy cap to
you.  My parents would have preferred, and tried to raise me, the rule
to the exception.  They wrested order and substance with determination
and often limited means.  Serious and disciplined though they exercised
their parental duties, I much cherish them for their laughter and love
of life.

Being an adult, for me, means making prudent choices, taking reasonable
risks, and acknowledging responsibility for one's life.  Not easy:
doing, balancing.

As I read what the parents and the younger people write I see that much
remains to make human life more meaningful, manageable, worthwhile, and
bearable.  I rather suspect much will remain seemingly irrational and
requiring modification to the last of sentient humanity.

Perhaps you may come to see that laughter helps many of us ease pain.
The E.G. saga and the joke I posted says much about contemporary
matters.  Especially Dade County these days.  The "end?" of the Cold
War.  Cuban-U.S. relations.  Cuban-Jewish culture clash.  The role of
government and the rule of law.

You want a better life and more support for you and your "kid."  Do you
see a million dollars of law enforcement as needed money some of which
might have flowed your way?  What if Miami had burned?  What cost then?

There's more to heaven and earth than we have in our philosophies or our
jokes, D.  And more wealth available and creatable than we can count.

Now how to work out some redistribution?  Perhaps we can start with a
few laughs.

S.

Original post snipped to honor private post.