Birthday week

I was preparing for my 69th birthday in a month, and sent a request into my corporate manager to take the whole week off. Things at my part time caretaker job was going smooth and I didn't forsee any problems. My plans were to travel to my sons home about 300 miles away to spend the weekend and celebrate my grandsons and my birthdays together.Then come home and replace my broken driveway. My manager was a little reluctant to give me the whole week off with no backup to cover emergencies, so I said I would handle any emergencies from home since I would only be gone for the weekend. My time off was approved. The weekend came and my wife and I were off to spend some time with the grandkids.We stayed at a Motel with a real nice pool for the kids to come and have some pool fun. After we checked in we met up with my 3 yr. old grandson,and him and I went shopping for the perfect present. We agreed on a $10.00 limit and within a half hour we had exactly what he wanted.As we were driving back to the house he was pointing out landmarks and telling me where to turn to get to his house, he was so excited because as soon as we got home the party was going to start. It was a small party, just his 3 brothers,2 sisters and thier Great Dane. We opened our presents and then it was cake and Ice cream. We let the desert settle and then headed for the motel for some swiming and fun. The next day we met for lunch then spent the afternoon socialiazing and giving driving lessons to a16 yr old. We headed back home for a day of rest before starting the driveway repair. My vacation was off to a great start . Shortly after arriving home I had an emergency call that the elevator in our handicap building was down.It turned out to be a minor repair , but took up most of the next morning. Around mid afternoon the contractor for the driveway showed up with his equipment and was ready to start. I had agreed to be his helper to cut down on some of the cost so I straped on my back brace and we began breaking up the old concrete. Laying out the new forms we decided to make it 5 ft. wider which ment we would have to do it in two different pours. One day breaking and hauling concrete,two days pouring concrete, and my whole body was throubing with pain. Wednesday we were finishing up the last part and I started feeling cramps in my gut. I went inside to rest for awhile then headed for the bathroom! I was in the bathroom every half hour for the next two days with diearea.Then the gas started and lasted the next two days. I decided that I had gotten Listeria from the cantalope I had from the week before. By Sunday I was starting to feel normal again, just in time to go back to work. This will probably be one of the most memorable birthday weeks of my life. A little get away, a little fun, a lot of hard labor, and a lot of pain, but thats life and I will simply continue to live it to the best of my ability.

Earl Baldwin

What Freedom?

I wrote this back in 2009 but it is relevant for today.

What freedom ?
Have you ever thought about what freedom really is to you? It's been on my Mind a lot lately since Obama became our president. I thought it was pretty cool to have a black president, and I expected to see him fulfill his promises, and lead us on to greater prosperity and more freedoms. Although I did not vote for him, I did want to see a change for a better America.
Instead our constitution is being torn apart and our freedom taken away. People are becoming so angry and hateful with little conscious or remorse for their actions. I love America and the values it was founded upon, and I love my freedoms. I don't want to loose my ability to choose how I live.
My freedom is the right to pray to God every day
My freedom is the right to have coffee in the morning.
My freedom is the right to have my own health care insurance.
My freedom is the right to become an entrepreneur.
My freedom is my life, and I love my life.
If only we could focus more on the people who are breaking the laws and taking advantage of the loop holes and unregulated and unenforced programs. We would be able to start correcting many of the financial problems of our economy. I am not just talking about the big dogs in our government , but also the people like our neighbors on food stamps or some other assistance, who are abusing the programs. We could stop a lot of the waste and get back to taking responsibility for our own situations and correct a lot of the helpless and do nothing syndrome we seem to be suffering from.
It would be wise for us to look back to our founders and think about how our freedoms came about, and then look at now and see how many of them have been abused and even taken away.

I believe in our constitution and simply living life to the best of my ability, enjoying the freedoms given to me.
MAY GOD HAVE MERCY ON AMERICA
Earl Baldwin

Why I enjoy my perfect job

I had been looking for several months to find a partime retirement job, one where I could help people, and improve their living quarters. I had been doing property maintenance for several years and really enjoyed it.
While my wife was reading the paper one morning she circled a small add for a building maintenance caretaker and told me I should check this out.I got online and filled out an application and the next day I received a call asking me to come in for an interview right away. The interview went good and I was hired the following day.

Right away I was thinking this is the perfect job for me. I had the responsibilities of upkeep, maintenance, and repairs of two buildings. Both of the buildings were in pretty good condition, although very little maintenance had been done in the last few years. One building has 8 apartments and the other building has 24 apartments. Each of the buildings is occupied with people who have some sort of disability and are not able to do any repairs themselves.

Many of the people are confined to their wheel chair but are still very mobile and able to go wherever they want to. Also there are about 10 of the residents who travel around in power wheel chairs who I see on a daily basis. Two of these people out of many that I would like to mention are who makes my work days so special.

Eric and Kay have gradually become my inspiration for doing the best job possible.
Eric lives on the second floor and Kay lives on the first. They are good friends and visit each other often, they must go past the office each time they go out or check their mail, and I always leave the door open so any one can come in, but usually they just go by and always give me a greeting, like (Hi Earl or Morning Earl) or like Eric says "Earl's Snacking again". I have done several repairs in both of their apartments, and they are always so appreciative of how quickly the repair was made or taken care of. They both have a good outlook on life and usually seem happy with their environment. This makes coming to work a pleasure and I look forward to seeing them each day.

My office is located on the first floor just inside the main entrance,and the mail boxes are on the other side of my office. I have windows on three walls so I can sit in the office and see pretty much every thing that is going on. When I first started this job I was advised not to become personally involved in the residents lives, so I have pretty much stuck to greetings and uplifting comments. It has been no surprise that over the last year and a half most of the people have shared a lot of positive feed back, not only to me but to the corporate property managers. Granted there have been stressful times but for the most part this has been the perfect job and the reason I enjoy it so much. The people and variety of tasks I do each day is what Simply Living Life to the best of my ability is all about.