December 23, 2008 1:22 PM
It's still a wonderful life
A meditation on bailouts I published yesterday at the Christian Science Monitor (an excellent paper, by the way):
Living through 'It's a Wonderful Life' By Barbara Curtis
In the Year of the Bailout, some of us found our inner George Bailey.This year, as big corporations streamed to Washington for handouts, families like mine - with no groveling rights before Congress - struggled to scrape by. Many of us have spent the year trying to sell, trying to downsize, trying not to be bitter. And along the way, some have discovered the truth behind the clichés: there really are bright sides, silver linings, and second chances. Home is where the heart is. And as Clarence, the unlikely angel-in-training, tells George Bailey, "No man is a failure who has friends."
Remember "It's a Wonderful Life"? As a boy, George dreams of travel and adventure, but grows into manhood trapped by circumstances in Bedford Falls, where he makes the best of it by growing a family and running an S&L with soul. As played by Jimmy Stewart, Bailey epitomizes every man who's ever put the needs of others before his own - not presented as sainthood, but a conflicted reality.
Our family has watched this film together for so many years, I can't remember the first time I saw it. What I do know is that this year I lived it.
Read entire article here.
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Comments
That's such a wonderful movie, and you intertwined your own life and the similarities with the movie so beautifully; I can't wait to see that movie again tomorrow.
I wish you a wonderful Chirstmas! Many blessing to you and the rest of the family.
Love. Always.
Posted by: LadyLovas | December 23, 2008 4:23 PM
I could tell the same story. A lost job. A tight budget, and cards coming anonymously in the mail with cash and grocery gift cards. Cards handed to us at church with the same. It lifts you up to know that someone cares enough to give like that. With no recognition or strings attached. Just because you are loved.
Posted by: Kathy | December 23, 2008 5:46 PM
We too gathered to see and discuss "It's a Wonderful Life" at my suggestion. But what I can seem to get across is that we all now live in Potterstown, the place where George Bailey's savings and loan closed, owned by that nasty greedy spider, Mr Potter. We have lived there ever since savings and loans all became really banks in the S&L crisis. And we have moved deeper and deeper into a world where the little guys are just schmucks living on crumbs from high tables. And those high tables have worked hard to confuse and divide us.
But, in the words of Woody Guthery, "We ain't down yet. Naw, we ain't down yet" Said in the era of the New Deal...which followed another Potterstown...
Posted by: Hugh Henry | December 25, 2008 7:04 PM
