My Story and the 9 Truths I Discovered
I began my life changing journey fighting hunger on a cool autumn Thursday in Woodstock, New York in 2005 where I volunteered for the first time at the local food pantry.
I was assigned a shift with Marie Duane. I drove over to the Woodstock Reformed Church, parked my car behind the buildling and cautiously walked in. I had never been to the pantry before.
I entered the empty hallway and found the pantry on the right. I walked into the room and there it was: a small space, actually, about 12′ by 16′. Each wall supported a set of metal shelving units. Each unit stood about 6′ high and 3′ deep with 4 shelves. Most of the shelves were empty. A few shelves had some food:
cereal
tuna
soup
peanut butter.
There was a little handwritten note in front of each display:
person: 1 item, family: 1 item.
There may have been other items on shelves but I don’t remember them.
A small table stood in the center of the room. A metal folding chair was placed in front of each window.
We sat in the chairs, Marie and I, and chatted as people trickled in. We discussed the usual: weather, gardening, knitting, decorating the alter at St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church.
“Hi. How are you? Will you please sign your name here?” Each shopper signed in and noted the number of adults, seniors, and children in the household. After signing in, the person walked around the room selecting from the cereal, peanut butter, tuna, and soup. The selected food was placed on the table and bagged to take home, wherever or whatever that was.
On this morning, not blessed with any psychic knowledge, I was totally unaware of experiences waiting for me in the pantry. Never in my wildest thoughts did I envision the hall filled with hungry people, the tiny room packed with fresh produce and jammed with shoppers.
Nor did I for 1 moment ponder the push back I would experience as the number of hungry seeking food grew. Within a few short years, this 2 dozen single homeless men – mostly Woodstock’s colorful characters – had swelled (due to a tanking economy) to over 300 people weekly. This number finally approached 500 people weekly before it was all over.
Now, in the autumn of 2015, our stock market experiences numerous “corrections”. I realize I learned some things over the years which, for me, are ground truths about the pantry.
Feeding the hungry with dignity is the most important thing.
Single homeless men are now far outnumbered by members of the Struggling Class, households of working people holding down 2 and 3 jobs just to pay the rent and buy the gas to get to work.
The 3 most hot button words in the English language are food, sex, and money. These 3 words are concerned with a person’s core beliefs, emotions, and spiritual attitudes. Food and money, or the lack thereof, loom large in pantries.
The sidewalks in our communities and cities have become wards of untreated mentally ill people. In our great nation we don’t hospitalize or otherwise treat many of our mentally ill. Instead, they they are incarcerated.
Some of these untreated mentally ill happen to be homeless. Homeless is not a category of people. It’s just a situation that happens. It can happen to anyone.
The 50+ senior population has many who lack enough $$$ for food and are largely a silent group. The bottom line is this: When our grandparents don’t get enough to eat, they often get sick.
I’m seeing a whole generation of children who have never been inside a grocery store.
Shoppers at our pantry can get a 3-day supply of food weekly. Their job is to make it last 7 days. Many share this food with a pet. Often, the only thing a person has left from a prosperous past is the dog.
The most difficult thing I see in the pantry is a Korean War vet getting food. Something I just can’t understand is how a person who served in a very brutal war, and subsequently spent an adult life working and paying taxes should have to be in a food pantry line in his old age.
Much of the food available to the hungry in food pantries is diverted from its trip to the landfill.
There is absolutely no excuse for anyone in our great nation to go hungry.
Thank you for reading this blog. The story is true. The people are real.
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Thurman Greco
The Debate Rages On
An older man came into the pantry wearing a baseball cap which read “Korean War Veteran”. I simply could not then and cannot now understand how this man, who fought as a soldier in the very brutal Korean conflict in the 1950’s is now, as an old man, reduced to standing in a pantry line for food.
ACTUALLY, I KNEW THE ANSWER. His social security check is just not large enough to buy food and he’s outlived his savings.
One day a tall, handsome man with a generous head of wavy white hair, approached me in Bread Alone. “I want to shake your hand. I worked all my life. When I was laid off recently, I realized that I’m never going to work again. If it weren’t for your efforts in the pantry, I would be going hungry.”
George, while he had white hair, was not yet old enough for social security. So, he relied on unemployment, food stamps, and the pantry. The hope in these cases is always that the unemployment insurance will last until the social security kicks in.
ONE FAMOUS ARTIST SHOPPED REGULARLY while going through foreclosure. He kept a positive attitude about the whole thing. But, the sorrow was unavoidable. He ended up living in Kingston. He still made it over to the pantry whenever he could for about a year afterward. The transition out of Woodstock was very difficult.
SOME PEOPLE HAD THEIR OWN OPINIONS ABOUT THE SITUATION:
“Thurman, you are serving entirely too much food to these people. You can’t do this.”
“Thurman, you’re filling this building with vagrants and riffraff. You need to keep the riffraff out.”
“Thurman, why are you serving fresh fruits and vegetables in the pantry? You
shouldn’t do this.”
“Thurman, why are you giving food to her? She is not a responsible parent. She needs to be raising her children more responsibly.”
OFTEN THESE OPINIONS WERE SHARED BY PEOPLE WHO DIDN’T HAVE THE FACTS AND WHO HAD NEVER BEEN HUNGRY.
When people begin to debate poverty, they always seem to talk
family,
race,
money,
culture.
THIS IS THE WRONG DEBATE. What we need to discuss is power, inequality, and exploitation.
Seniors, due to their age, are exploited because, when they quit working or get a retirement job, they lose their power.
Women are exploited in both the workplace and domestic situations. They are not paid equal wages for jobs performed.
POOR PEOPLE ARE EXPLOITED BECAUSE THEY LACK THE RESOURCES TO FIGHT BACK.
POVERTY IS A HIGHLY CHARGED ISSUE. If you don’t believe me, try listening to politicians rage on about how the minimum wage should or should not be increased. The Obama care battle is still being waged. The movement to gut the food stamp benefits and unemployment benefits is popular.
Corporate downsizing is routine in our country with layoffs occuring in both good times and bad.
THE SAFETY NET FOR THE HUNGRY IS ALL BUT GONE.
Workers in America have no overtime pay, no retirement funds, no health insurance, and no voice.
Minimum wages in tandem with part time employment force people to work several jobs. Holding down 2 or 3 jobs is the norm in communities throughout our country.
IN OUR NATION WE EXPLOIT THE POOR, PUNISH THEM FOR NOT MAKING MORE $$$ AND LABEL THEM IRRESPONSIBLE BECAUSE THEY DON’T HAVE BETTER JOBS, EDUCATION, RESOURCES.
How can a person:
get a better job which does not exist?
get more education when the $$$ to pay for it is not available to him/her?
pay for healthcare when there in’t even enough $$$ for food?
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
