Manual labor or labor by Manuel?

Maybe I was wrong saying the illegals are taking jobs Americans don't want. Thinking back there were twice and many kids coming into the world when I was born in the mid forties. We had seven kids in our family and you would get nothing, unless you worked for it. Even the "Leave it to Beaver" families made the kids work in some way. We used to sell greeting cards, flower seeds or whatever, door to door just to get enough money to buy that new bike or cap gun. One of our rituals was to pick strawberries, raspberries, pine cones, potatoes and we were paid by the bushel or pound. How many young people do you know do that today? I remember clearly when I was in 7Th grade and wanted to go out for football but didn't have the money for the ten dollar insurance we all had to have, one of the teachers heard about it somehow, and asked me to rake leaves for the money and I was excited to do it. Later years I set bowling pins (job doesn't exist any more). In high school we took shop (woodworking) and I learned so much from it. Sometimes the counselors might ask why I wanted to take it every year thinking that maybe it was just an easy subject, but I really liked it. Later in life and even to this day I use knowledge from wood shop when building houses, and so forth. Not everyone can work in the computer connected industry. Some have to do physical work, also. When I was doing my radio work, which I enjoyed, I also enjoyed and sometimes even more so, getting out there and framing a house, hanging doors and cabinets, building decks. When one is done for the day, you at least can stand back and see what you accomplished. Very rewarding. My son Joey and daughter Gina framed homes with me in High School and College and loved it. I know it is hard if you have kids and you are doing fairly well, not to just give them things without working for it. I'm guilty of that even as a grandparent but whenever I think of something for them to do to make a little money I'll ask them. They have picked raspberries with Kathy and me. When Kathy and I lived in Portland we would pick berries for extra money which we needed at the time. Never for a minute felt too good to do it. We learned a lot, also from the folks that had to do it 8 to 14 hours a day. My point to all this and I don't mean to lecture or tell you what to do, but feel you should make your children work for at least some money. I know most of us didn't want that for our kids and we would rather they play sports, and study in school instead. They can do all of that but maybe not at the extent some of us did when we were kids. Pick some strawberries for money this spring. Raspberries, potatoes later on and see what it feels like. When you get older you never regret any hard worked you did as a kid. A lot of children were over worked and that is not good either. I just think it is good to walk in someone else’s shoes for a while and make us all more understanding. Sometimes even I forget… Cheers, Joe