Ron---good for you on learning to say "no". Greg and I have run ourselves ragged over the last 5 years or so in community activism, volunteering and serving on boards. I have realized that the people who do the most work in this regard (in our town anyway) don't have kids. Raising kids is so much harder that maybe we volunteer out of guilt that we aren't raising kids!
All of the councilpeople we've helped, all of the city activites---planting trees, being docents, monitoring streams, organizing neighborhoods to deal with their own issues, was of no help to us when we faced our own problems. No one helped us fight for our historic district, which is being destroyed by developers.
We have also helped out so many people on their films for free.
So for the first time, the past year, we have learned to say "no" because we realized that if we didn't, we would never move to the new house.
Saying "no" has been a very liberating experience for us.
We still volunteer for a few groups, including SMA and our new neighborhood group, but generally, until we move, our mantra will be:
JUST SAY NO!
