Charity Begins at Home

From time to time, you hear about Bill Gates donating ridiculous amounts of money to the poor and the downtrodden and that disadvantaged youth. MILLIONS. How incredibly generous of him. How kind and thoughtful. My only problem is from where he gets his money.

You see, Microsoft if a filthy outsourcer. He takes jobs, and has them done overseas for a fraction of the cost. Now, you could argue the moral responsibility of business, or that it does not exist. You would have a point. My point is that I don't want to have to hear valuable news time wasted having his "donations" reported to me. All he is doing is robbing the lower middle class and giving to some of the poor. My hero.

Why can't he, as well as many other companies set up shop here in their "beloved" country (that they can only take from)? That would be charity. He is giving up profits for the good of the people of this country, and in turn, the country itself. I would even listen to a report explaining why it is charity.

I'll tell you why. Because, it is neither sensational or exciting to help people in general. It's always gotta be a cause or program, which, by the way, spends up to 80% paying its staff, with a meager amount going to the actual cause. (See: Red Cross in San Diego, the church in general.) Will it be too late? Will we go the way of the Roman Empire before someone figures out that the middle class pay most of the taxes and support this country?

If you kill the body, the head will die.

Someone's Gotta Be On Top

Coming of age, every guy is stereotyped as the horndog, and every girl is stereotyped as the one responsible for setting the boundaries. It's there, and not only did we all buy it, we all bought into it, and all perpetuated it. Not only in our actions, but our sense of guilt at being called on it. When I got into college, I figured that everybody, male and female, wants to be desired, and everybody likes sex. What confused me is why I would be treated poorly for desiring my partner. If you're with me, it should mean that you're attracted to me. I know that it wasn't for a lack of desire, because there were many times where desire was demonstrated.* I was getting tired of the initiation being one way.

And that's why this is one of my favorite stories.

I had been dating this woman that was in my psychology class. Like most of us in college, she had several roommates. At one point while visiting, she turned to me and said, "You want to go out to the rock and talk"?
"Yea, sure."
"JUST. TALK."
"Okay, okay."
It was time to make a stand. I wasn't dating her. WE were dating. I was going to honor her wishes.
We go out to this rock, and talk. We are right next to each other. She is on my left, sitting on the rock, and I am standing, leaning against it. This puts our faces level with each other, but I keep my hands to myself. She takes the occasional opportunity to look at me, and a few of those times, I look back. (Cause really, I was there to kiss her, and too much face-to-face would bring down my house of horndog. Big picture, think big picture asshopper.) At one point, she asks,
"Is there anything wrong"?
"No."
More talking goes on, and her hand comes to rest on my shoulder closest to her. Proverbally, she had just blinked. At this point, it was just a matter of time. It was a matter of me keeping my eye on the prize.
We talk some more, and her hand goes to the far shoulder. Still, hands to myself. This is the point where it became a little difficult, because I could have reciprocated, but that would have meant she got what she wanted, and I was still the bad guy for giving it to her. (Uh... you know what I mean!)
There's more talking, and some arm rubbing. Oh, dear lord, Mike. You've proven your point. Just say "Uncle!" Say it inside of her mouth if you want to. Just do it. (tm) The entire left side of my body was very aware that a woman was there, touching and wanting to be touched. Bad left side! Baaaad!
Okay, here's where I thought she might have been onto me. She turns her face so her lips are two inches from my left cheek. She's talking, and seductive puffs of her breath flagulate my face. The left side of my head is burning, and that thing that magnetically pulls your face to her is going off like an air-raid siren. ("Siren." "Rocks." Get it? *sigh*) No! Not... give... in... Eyes... prize... vision... blurry...
Had to end this quickly. What do I do? Slowly yet innocently, I turn my face so my lips are about an inch from hers. I smile, and I TURN BACK. HA! "Ha" is right. I think I damaged something internally.
She kissed my cheek; closed mouth yet full. I leaned into it a little more than I wanted. I chalking her not catching onto my game to her total and totally understandable confusion to my lack of response. I responsed to her kiss with a "Thank you."
By that time, we weren't saying much. I had forgotten most of my English, and she had been busy giving in. By that time, she kept her face pointed at mine. I was considering adjusting the location of the finish line when I felt a finger hook my chin. With hands still to myself, I let her turn my face to meet her.

YES! YESYESYESYES! WINNER! WINNER! WINNER! She was kissing me. Could she feel my smile? They could in China. Despite the fact that we had gone outside to "just talk," she had broken down, made it something else. SHE was, in fact, the horndog. Not a Master Horndog such as myself, but a shy, nice-girl version that actually like all the things I liked. Persecution ends THERE! Seriously, everybody wins. I'm not a bad guy for chasing you, and it's not your job to wait for me to make the first move.

Later, as we were leaving the rock, "Hey, didn't we just come out here to talk"?


*Years later, it would occur to me that being The Keeper of the Boundaries came with its own burden, and many of those negative reactions could be traced back to guilt or just the struggle not to do what you really want to do, but fear being labeled or self-consciousness. It will be years after one enters adulthood that the sexes figure out that the other sex does not think like them AT ALL... which could be a separate entry all its own. What usually solves this is a talk. You agree that saying "not right now" doesn't make someone the bad guy, and neither does being attracted to someone. Really, as you age out of college, women become more comfortable with themselves, therefore their sex drive climbs. Guys tend to mellow out. For about two years, we meet in the middle. Then, women go into their thirties, and their compatible sex partner is... a college freshman *sigh*.