What interesting times: just a couple weeks after the state's flagship newspaper ran a damning article regarding our University of MN branch here, now we learn that the employees on campus are not even happy. They have gone on strike. There is nothing that would cause me to hurl invective and profanities better than word of a strike.
The KARE-TV report on YouTube this morning started out with a photo of people on strike at the Morris campus. Morris has sure been a newsmaker of late. The Strib article came at us with the giant headline that included the word "nosedive" in describing our enrollment. I imagine that UMM's leaders will say they can fix things. But then we have to ask: how did we get to this low point?
Regarding the strike now, nothing makes my blood boil faster than to see an employee in an interview saying "we didn't want to strike." Oh, so they "had to."
We used to hear public school teacher unions proclaiming this too. I think the state has tamped down the power of public school (K-12) teacher unions. We don't hear about them making strike threats now. If it happens it's subdued. In the early 1980s it seemed every teachers union in the state was either going on strike or threatening to do so.
In Morris I took a photo of two teachers posing with picket signs they were planning to show/brandish. The strike was avoided here. But the power of our teachers union still became a problem. By the end of the '80s there was a schism in the community that was highly uncomfortable. I shook my head because there was a segment on the teaching staff that did not recognize valid issues that much of the public wanted to see addressed.
Of course public school systems are always going through transitions. Often when a school administrator has to leave under duress, it's because that person was not adapting. I have seen this vividly.
I made a pledge a long time ago to my main contact person at UMN-Morris: "If we ever have a strike with picketers again at UMM, I'll never contribute another nickel to the U."
For a very long time I thought the strike possibility abated. It was like a bad dream to remember the previous one. So, these union members say "we don't want to strike but we have to." Oh, those mean and vindictive U administrators, forcing their help to live a life with such adversity.
I think most Morris residents feel the UMM jobs are pretty nice. But the UMM workers say they "have to" strike. Well, I hope and pray that they fail.
I hope picketers aren't out by my daily walking route which skirts the north end of campus and then proceeds along Prairie Lane. And BTW wouldn't there be room for a nice new city park out there? Far enough away from residential neighborhoods? Might be the best place for a public stage.
I would be so revulsed by the sight of a gang of picketers. How would this action affect the day-to-day operations of UMM? If it does not, then we are wasting money paying these people at all. Let them disperse to look for jobs in the private sector. See how their benefits would stack up.
If I walk past the picketers, they might want to say something to me, give me their propaganda. Most passers-by would smile and pretend to be sympathetic, right? Unions have power. In fact I would argue that unions are all about power - that's all there is. They'll take what they can get, turn the screws whatever way they can.
Why am I writing so much here? All I have to say is a royal "f--k you" to all those people.
Double whammy
At the same time my relationship with UMM is severed, well can you believe this? I've had to cancel my church membership too. I just did that last week. First Lutheran Church is no longer a place where you can go for a simple Sunday service. The building is "dark" every other Sunday, idle.
We didn't even have real high standards at the end. All I wanted was for FLC to survive, maybe with the hope of getting vitality back somehow.
All of a sudden the FLC members were told they'd have to attend the local Methodist/UCC church every other Sunday. Every other Sunday! First the arrangement was just for summer. Then the hammer came down: it would continue for another nine months! And then what? Nine months would take us to next summer. Why didn't they just say 12 months?
God's home is in full retreat. I don't even know that much about the Methodists. I know the Methodists have been fractured by gay rights. And the UCC? Someone told me they are even more liberal than the ELCA. I checked online and confirmed that.
Health care
At the same time I'm floating along with a life preserver that barely keeps me above water, I had to cancel my recommended colonoscopy at SCMC because I could not arrange for a ride home. They do not allow you to use Morris Transit. I told a nurse that maybe a sheriff's deputy could give me a lift. It might even be good for both me and the deputy to have a pleasant encounter, after some of the other encounters I've had.
The nurse didn't really respond to my suggestion. I suppose my idea would be just another form of "public transportation." Well, let me tell you, when I left the hospital about three years ago after my life-saving surgery administered by Dr. Sam - what a saint - I was in far worse shape then I would be after a colonoscopy. I drove home by myself. In fact it was at night.
I have actually had two colonoscopies earlier in my life and had no problems or issues. As the years go on, the walls close in, in terms of just not having any friends or family anymore. And now that I've quit my church, I cannot look to that. So I did not have the medical procedure done.
What a pile of adversity that has come along.
For a long time my association with the U of M was a way to feel I still had a purpose. The rug has been pulled out. In the morning I have breakfast at the counter of DeToy's Restaurant. Looks like that's the last bastion for me having any kind of connection to anything. I had a caramel roll and oatmeal this morning. God bless Karrie who works there. She takes care of me.
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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