$24 A Day.

Sieving through some old emails the other day and found one with a slide presentation attached entitled "The Cost of A Child".

Read (in slide format) like this:

"The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a middle income family. Talk about price shock.  That doesn't even touch college tuition.

But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down.  It translates into:

*    $8,897 a year;

*    $741 a month;

*    $171 a week;

*    A mere $24 a day;

*    Just over $1 an hour.

Still, you might think the best financial advice is: Don't have children if you want to be 'rich.'  

Actually, it is just the opposite.

What do you get for your $160,140?

•   Naming rights - first, middle, and last!

•   Glimpses of God every day.

•   Giggles under the covers every night.

•   More love than your heart can hold.

•   Butterfly kisses and Velcro hugs.

•   Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm cookies.

•   A hand to hold usually covered with jelly or chocolate.

•   A partner for blowing bubbles and flying kites.

•   Someone to laugh yourself silly with, no matter what the boss said or how your stocks performed that day.

You get to:

•   Finger-paint,

•   Carve pumpkins,

•   Play hide-and-seek,

•   Catch lightning bugs.

You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under refrigerator magnets and collect spray painted noodle wreaths for Christmas, hand prints set in clay for Mother's Day, and cards with backward letters for Father's Day.

You have an excuse to:

•    never grow up;

•    keep reading the Adventures of Piglet and Pooh;

•    watch Saturday morning cartoons;

•    go to Disney movies;

•    and wish on stars.

You get to be a hero just for:

•    Retrieving a Frisbee off the garage roof,

•    Taking the training wheels off a bike,

•    Removing a splinter,

•    Filling a wading pool,

•    Coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs,

•    And coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated to ice cream regardless.

You get a front row seat in history to witness the:

•    First step,

•    First word,

•    First bra,

•    First date,

•    First time behind the wheel.

You get to be immortal.

You get another branch added to your family tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called grandchildren and great grandchildren. You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.

 

In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there under God. 

You have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them without limits - so one day they will, you, love without counting the cost.

For a mere $24 a day, there is no greater bang for your buck.  That is quite a deal for the price. 

Love and enjoy your children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

It's the best investment you'll ever make."

[courtesy of www.tommyswindow.com]

Made me smile.  

For about 3 seconds...

Check It In.

Abbie Intang.  The human turtle.  A porter who has been journeying the road less traveled along the slopes of Mount Kinabalu for as long as he can probably remember.  Carrying large loads for others.  Merchandise, everyday necessities, at cumbersome proportions.  Employing sinew and spirit, between base and peak on a daily basis, just so that the day-end gratitude is sufficient to translate into coin that sees to him feeding his family of eight. 

Your life is tough?  Get off your high horse and smell the fcuking roses, Charlie.  Options for some are limited.

Loads.  We all carry them.  In some form or another.  Some more than others. 

But just how much can one take?  How much strength, tenacity and will do you need to walk that mile with something alien to your being - attached clumsily to your body, your mind, like a parasite that denies being shaken off, but instead sucks your mana dry.  What and when is it considered regular, when is it not?  When do you buckle?  When do you break?  What are your limits?  Do you know them?

If you do not, then be prepared to sink to a gradual but eventual low.  Your life will change.  Oh boy.  Do not rejoice my friend, because you will get ugly.  Be prepared to find yourself alone, angry and bitter.  From the depths of your psyche where your insecurities well, you will naturally and conveniently unleash selfish expression.  You will lament.  You will think you have it bad and project your ill sense of hardship on to others to gain some form of recognition or sympathy.   Pain will come because you think it and welcome it.  But at what expense and what the fcuk for?  

In our journey, we choose how we travel.  What with.  And whom with.  Whether we find ourselves crippled by the burdens we carry one day is dependent on the choices we make today.  The principle lesson is to never overextend.  Do not be the camel that you aren't. 

If the load doesn't have a purpose, dump it.  Leave it whence it appeared.  Nothing more than baggage.  Weight that you don't need. 

So unless you have eight mouths to feed, take flight... glide and soar.  Like the eagle you were meant to be.  Up from way high.

You're not a punching bag.  You're not anyone's porter ass mule.

Fcuk that.  Play your options.  Choose your load.  You are your own life.