My son just got hired to a full time job two months after graduating with honors from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia with a BS in Communications with a specialty in Video editing. I’m so happy! I decided with all the gloom out here, to share this with all of you, as a gift of real HOPE.

My wife and I scrimped and saved to put him and our daughter (in her third yr. at Marymount Manhattan College) through school and were both so proud of him today. Frankly, with the way things are out here right now we were worried for him as he graduated. But, he got right out here and was working a week after he graduated as a bar back and while working made the connection for a full time job in his field as a Video editor and Videographer!

I can’t even express how wonderful it feels to know he will now be able to make it on his own. For many of you here who are parents, I’m sure you know how we feel today. It’s a milestone that we all work toward. Of course our responsibilities don’t end here and I have to get him a car now to commute, but we’ll do that with pleasure. It was all worth it to see the joy on his face when he got the call and came and told us.

Anyway, with so much seriousness and so much negativity going on right now and being reported here, I thought you’d all enjoy a different kind of story today. Maybe, just maybe all is not lost yet in America. If our young people can still find work I think we can pull ourselves out of this terrible ditch we’ve somehow slid into. It certainly gave me a shot of happiness and hope and maybe it will do the same for some of you today. As, the character RED said in the classic movie "The Shawshank Redemption", "Hope is a good thing."