January 14, 2009 – When the garbage truck arrived, my dogs all got focused. Frieda, bless her, did not gave chase. She has come a long way. Rose is also poised to herd garbage trucks. Lenore loves garbage and Izzy is too cool for running around in the snow.

Watching the news from Haiti, I decided not to write about it much on this blog. There is enough news about it elsewhere, and it is horrifying, and people coming here don’t need me to remind them. I am sending money and offering to go if it would be helpful. Can’t imagine that it would. I know we are all thinking of the awful suffering, and enough said by me.

I got a lot of messages back about my writing about the degradation of work in America. It’s been a longtime issue of mine as a write. My first novel “Sign Off” was about the destruction of the idea of loyalty that once existed between American employers and employees, an absurd idea today. I am eager for a political leader to emerge – not from the “left” or “right” but from a sense of the country and challenge the idea that people can see their whole ideas of meaningful work destroyed by one greedy corporation after another. Profit and loss is important, but it ought not be the only measure of a successful company.

Seeing the movie “Up In The Air” last night reminded me of just how crippled our media have become at raising issues that are really important to us. The only stories we see are about politicians bickering in Washington, talking heads reducing every issue to two rigid points of view. Work is a seminal issue for most of the people I know. It is crushing for human beings to be thrown out in the street like outdated desks, with little security or help in building a new future. It breaks people, terrifies them, and dispirits them profoundly. I gave up working for companies years ago because I believed there was more security in working for myself. Can you imagine? More security as a writer?

I have no regrets about it.

When did the idea die that secure and dignified work is a right, and people who work hard and loyalty have as many rights as CEO’s, stockholders and fat and happy Boards of Directors? I don’t remember voting on that.

I dislike politics. This is not a left-right issue to me, but an elemental issue of human dignity. One reason I have so much trouble with the Wal-Mart  idea – I completely understand why people shop and work there – is that this is part of the culture that has eliminated so many good and independent jobs and reduced our value system to a matter of cheapest prices and, on the other end, the bottom line. They are connected. Good jobs cannot stand up to the idea that the point of all life is to buy the cheapest thing. Just ask factory workers in China.

Perhaps we should reward humane companies with our money. See how they change.

Anyway, back to my meaningful work. We have a right to be encouraged, to be secure, to have meaningful work. Like the man said, Work and Love.