2004/09/22

A Post I Really Am Not Enjoying Writing

I just added an Amazon bleg button (Update: There is also a PayPal button now.) to my sidebar. I didn't want to. Things like that are hard on a man's ego. When I started blogging, I did so with no delusions of getting rich from it and no intention to ever use my blog to ask for help. I thought if I could get a few dozen people to read what I posted and maybe change someone's mind now and then that would be more than enough to justify the effort I put into it. Sometimes life forces people to do things they'd rather not.

Those of you who've read my bio, or some of my other posts, may know that I'm too sick to hold down a job, possibly ever again. The condition the VA doctors think I have isn't life-threatening, at least not in the near future, but it is disabling. I can spend several hours a day sitting in front of a computer, but not on any predictable schedule, and any job that requires any significant physical labor or spending a major part of the day standing or talking is out of the question. I'm waiting for the VA and Social Security people to decide whether they're going to help, and in the mean time the only thing keeping me out of a homeless shelter is my younger sister's generosity. I'm writing this sitting in one corner of of the room where I slept from the time I was 7 years old until I left for college.

My sister is currently off work, without pay, waiting for the soreness to go away and the lab results to come back from a lumpectomy/ biopsy performed yesterday morning. All I can do to help is make a feeble attempt at some of the household chores, pray for her, and bleg. It's not supposed to be this way, damn it! I'm supposed to be 13, helping my baby sister learn to walk; I'm supposed to be calling her from Saigon to wish her a happy 10th birthday; I'm supposed to be going to work every day and trying to send some money home now and then. She isn't supposed to be trying to take care of me, I'm supposed to be taking care of her.

I'm not asking for money for luxuries, I'm asking for help keeping food on my sister's table and the lights on. The closest thing to a luxury involved is a rented computer (Gateway is back-ordered on power supplies; I guess they're supposed to outlast the warranty.) and a broad-band internet connection, and those will be the first things to go as things get worse.

Please don't help if you can't afford it, but if you can and want to it will mean a lot.

While I'm on the subject, I'm a reasonably competent non-fiction writer and a fair to middlin' web site designer. There's nothing I'd like better than to find something I can do from home on a by-the-job basis of some sort and remove the bleg button from my site. Any ideas? My email address is just a little way below the bleg button on my sidebar.

Thanks for listening. God bless.

Update: My baby sister does have cancer. Please read A heartfelt public Thank You.

9 Comments:

At 7:02 AM, Blogger Soldiers Angels said...

We need a BIG Donation button, so we know how to donate,
Count on Soldiers Angels to help, also Angels In Camoflage helps Vets quite abit, they are online as well,
Let me know how to donate,
Patti

 
At 4:34 PM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

 
At 4:36 PM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

Patti,

Thank you!

How can I contact you? I'll try to figure out how to reach you through Soldiers Angels but I'll also leave this note here asking you to email me if you still want to help and don't hear from me.

-- Bill

 
At 5:53 PM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

Tom,

First – Thank you!

If you want to help by mail, you can send a check or money order to:

Vicki Hussey
RR1 Box 271
Lawrenceville IL 62439

I’ve gotten 3 or 4 mails like yours in the last hour or so and have emailed Amazon to ask what’s going on. I’m wondering at this time whether there’s an unreasonably low daily limit on donations. If there is, the button may start working again tomorrow morning.

Thank you for caring. Aside from the unpaid bills piling up, the show of support we’ve seen today has been wonderful for my sister’s morale.

Grateful kind regards
-- Bill Faith


Tom (noreply-comment@blogger.com) wrote:
Bill,
I tried to send you a donation through Amazon, but it wouldn't let me. If you have an address where I can send a check or a paypal account, let me know at tomault@cs_dot_cmu_dot_edu.

--
Posted by Tom to In Bill's World at 10/6/2004 05:34:53 PM

 
At 2:19 AM, Blogger Mark Butterworth said...

I tried to send a donation through Amazon, too, and it said recipient couldn't receive it at this time. Also, Paypal was down for maintenance. Please advise.

 
At 2:52 AM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

Mark, I don't have your email address or anything so I'll just have to hope you see this. There was a notice on PayPal’s site earlier that they would be down for a while for periodic maintenance. The best I can do is hope you’ll try again later. Thanks for trying.

 
At 2:53 AM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

 
At 4:10 AM, Blogger Mark Butterworth said...

Bill, I have checked in and went to Paypal. My donation should come through fine, now. God bless and good luck to you. I hope this little bit helps.

Mark

 
At 4:34 AM, Blogger Bill Faith said...

Mark B.:  Thank you! I wish you'd left me an email address or something so I could send you a proper "Thank you." As it is, all I can say is "Click here."

 

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