To The Lifters

Submitted by Tiffany Bishop, DOR/Therapy Resource, Legend Healthcare & Rehabilitation, Greenville, TX

Our amazing ADOR George Palin and his wife have been working tirelessly to provide the entire building (and a few to our sister buildings) with cloth masks, and they are now working on gowns to keep us all safe. Today the team wanted to say a special thank-you to him. One of our other amazing PTAs, Heidi Carmichael, thanked George for providing her with a more comfortable mask (pictured — you gotta laugh sometimes, right?) and read the following poem as a thank-you. I thought this is so true of George and so many others who are going above and beyond to take care of each other and our residents.

There are just two kinds of people on earth today,
Just two kinds of people, no more, I say.
Not the rich and the poor, for to count a man’s wealth
You must first know the state of his conscience and health.
Not the humble and proud, for, in life’s little span,
Who puts on airs is not counted a man.
Not the happy and sad, for the swift counting years
Bring each man his laughter and each man his tears.
No, the two kinds of people on earth I mean
Are the people who lift and the people who lean.
Wherever you go you will find the world’s masses
Are always divided in just these two classes.
And oddly enough you will find, too, I ween,
There’s only one lifter to twenty who lean.
In which class are you? Are you easing the load
Of overtaxed lifters who toil down the road?
Or are you a leaner who lets others bear
Your portion of labour and worry and care?
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox