October 9, 2008
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The Daily News
1 Let’s face it.
2 We’re in a <depression>.
3 <whisper, whisper>
4 I have to think back to my post-college days when I lived a pretty poor existence, and I have to remind myself how I got by then: I kept working hard and grew my own gardens, grew my own carrots, grew my own pot, and grew my own integrity.
5 I’m absolutely astonished at the economy.
6 I won’t get the slightest bit political, because everyone is suddenly confused, worried, and looking for hope.
7 I didn’t really notice it until I hit my sanctuary, Save Mart, on the way home yesterday.
8 It isn’t always Save Mart, by the way. It’s usually the place I decide to stop and pick out a few late-afternoon groceries on the way home.
9 The first thing I noticed was that most other shopping carts had WAY fewer items in them than they normally do.
10 For the most part, I don’t peer into other peoples’ lives. I still don’t know half my neighbors’ names, for example. If I know people it’s a little different because life’s a village, but with people I don’t know, I prefer not knowing much about them.
11 But I DO look into other peoples’ shopping carts to see how they’re eating. It never ceases to amaze me how many unhealthy choices people make. I can’t help it. When I’m standing in line to pay for groceries, I always give sideways glances into other people’s shopping carts, and by association, into their lives.
12 I always avoid buying too many unhealthy things because I’m always afraid I might run into someone who would spread the word that I bought a basket of Froot Loops and gravy. I once ran into a former student at Longs Drugs. I had a bottle of vodka and some soda crackers in my cart. The guy asked me how I was doing. I just smiled, looked into my cart, and looked back up. He got it.
13 Anyway, I saw everyone shopping yesterday and noticed one thing: at the checkout line, people were smiling at babies, laughing, and acting reasonably normal. I thought it was a pretty nice testament to the human spirit.
14 I had just returned from an afternoon meeting in which teachers had heard about possibly not being paid in the coming months. These were many of the same people who remained grading papers last night until 7 p.m. Worry lines and hesitant comments were the order of the day at the meeting.
15 They talked not of teaching strategies, but of how many students were having trouble concentrating on their work because they were worried about things. Fancy that. Teachers putting students before their own concerns. Who knew?
16 Parents had been having conversations about foreclosures, so the students worried that they might be moving in the next few months. The teachers said that the students weren’t concerned about lessons so much as if they were going to be moving sometime soon due to hard times.
17 In Save Mart, I saw people keeping tremendously strong and happy. I saw mom’s with three kids and workers looking at babies and smiling.
18 But for the first time in my entire life, it felt as though there was an underlying worry out there that was completely unspoken. And yet, I saw an interesting spirit and strength I hadn’t seen since I had gone through a period of struggle when I had first gotten out of college.
20 We struggled back then because jobs were scarce and money almost non-existent.
21 I worked ten hours a day six days a week, grew my own food, and bicycled whenever I could.
22 I shopped at a cannery and stocked up on soy, beans, rice, powdered milk and simple products, much of it dairy in nature. If I HAD enough money, I could afford milk. I knew that if I had milk, cheese, bread, butter and eggs that I could live pretty well.
23 It takes a worried, worried man to sing a worried, worried song. I’m worried now, but I won’t be worried long.
24 We also grew huge gardens and shared cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, onions, etc. Sometimes we’d live half the summer on tomato and onion sandwiches, which cost all of a loaf of bread. We’d also have people come over for a potluck, and sit on logs out back, have a fire, play guitar, enjoy some cheap wine, and sing under the stars.
25 In a funny sort of way, when everyone was broke, life was richer in many ways. Yes, it was a struggle, but it was also lives filled with laughter, song, and sincere friendships. Food was shared, and there was a spirit of helping one another, and laughing and growing along the way.
26 It was paycheck to paycheck, but everyone worked wherever and whenever they could, and we simply cut out extravagances.
27 We didn’t know if there was a recession or anything. We struggled and worked hard to make ends meet.
28 Ironically, last month I received the largest paycheck of my life.
29 Did I invest it, save it, or tuck it away for a rainy day?
30 Of course not. I spent it like the proverbial drunken sailor.
31 And when my most recent check came in, there was a significant drop in pay. A raise that was supposed to have come in never made it. I also had lost ten working days’ pay when I stopped doing activities. AND I had them squirrel extra money away for me for two months in the summer. Add that all up and it was quite a drop.
32 Nothing I couldn’t handle, but at the meeting sat a few doom-and-gloomers, and the whisper around the water cooler was that we might not be paid, that other school districts had invested in some of the banks that have failed, and that there was literally zero monies in education right now.
33 That’s just teachers and students during these worried times. And the amazing thing is that I left school last night at around 7 p.m. Others remained late, because they were grading papers and working on lesson plans for students who might not even be there tomorrow.
34 Between that and the people in the supermarket, and everywhere on the news, I stared at a really uncertain future for the first time in my life. Personally I know that if things get worse, I am willing to take a second job, but I’ve now gone beyond pontificating about WHO is to blame for this very real crisis.
35 It’s easy to say that all are punished, but another side of me is outraged that people who should have been watching over this failed on a scale that is beyond all comprehension.
36 I guess the reason I bring up the people in Save Mart is that I also saw a human spirit that seemed to go back many years. I saw little children and old people, working people and people who are struggling, yet they all had smiles and looks that showed that somehow, we could all work through it.
37 We have to. Right now I don’t see things getting too much better, but I also know that people are fighters, and I’m getting ready to prepare for one of the most challenging times ever.
38 I do place the blame squarely on the shoulders of politicians and our trusted bankers and economists, of the people in whom we placed our trust. But at this point, placing blame seems a waste of the human spirit. Crying and pointing fingers is fruitless and a waste of time.
39 Bracing for a hard winter, but one that will hopefully fill our lives with things more meaningful than material things might become the order of the day in the coming years.
40 Time to dig in, for our children’s sake. Time to have pot lucks, songs, long days and laughter with family and friends once more. Family and friends cost nothing, and laughter is pure.
41 Let’s drink to the hard working people. Raise a glass to the common foot soldier. Raise a glass to his wife and his children.
42 Let’s drink to the salt of the earth.
43 Keep fighting.
44 Live life, love life.
45 Eat a pickle. Ride a motorsickle.
46 Peace.
~H~
