I am not sure if this is because I was listening to Paul Simon's Graceland this week, but I have been giving a lot of thought to the term "global village". The idea that electronic mass media collapses space and time barriers and that we all have a responsiblity for all the children in the world.

Top 5 Paul Simon songs
1. Loves Me Like A Rock
2. Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard
3. Late In The Evening
4. Have A Good Time
5. The Obvious Child

The reason I have been thinking about this concept is more personal than worrying about children in Lithuania or something like that. Obviously, there really isn't much I can do about that but do I worry about the children of my own extended family. If you see problems with your nieces, nephews, distant cousins. Do you help out? Or do you leave it alone out of respect to their parents who are also relatives of yours?

This is my current dilemma that I realized at our family BBQ this past weekend. I have no kids myself, nor do I have any desire to have one. So what do I know about how hard is to raise children. It's like having kids gets you into a certain club and if you don't have kids, you are not allowed an even temporary membership into that club.

This woman, unrelated to me, asked why I didn't have any kids. At first glance, there is nothing wrong with this question. But if you think about it, really, who's business is it? What if we had been trying for years unsuccessfully and this was a painful subject. Maybe I am gay and this is a marriage of convenience. Really, what answer does one expect to that type of question? I told her that the reason was that I was impotent. I thought it was a funny answer and it certainly shut her up.

Anyway, getting back to my dilemma. How involved does one get in the lives of family members who have screwed up regarding their children? I won't bore you with details of one specific family member, but rest assured, you would not believe the story even if I did. But do I offer to help out? Do I just sit idly by and watch things go from bad to worse. How will these parents react to my offer of help? Do I even want to get involved in that drama? Part of me wants to say "screw you" and "you fix it your own damn self since you are the one who made a mess of things in the first place". But then the other part of me sees how it is effecting this next generation and I know that I could help make things better.

The thought that always gets stuck in my head is that if I don't step in. Who will? And who is going to be there when I am 80 years old, stuck in some sort of Alzheimers dementia? I better hope that these same young kids who will be the foundation of our family don't get stuck with the same dilemma that I am currently embroiled in.

(my apologies for the vagueness of this posting, I just can't bend my mind around this whole thing and just needed to type it out for my own sake)