Today I volunteered at Loaves & Fishes, a soup kitchen in Santa Ana that serves a number of homeless men and woman, struggling families and a diverse group of people that could be classified as the “working poor.”
After serving a number of nacho and bean plates, I found myself at a shaded lunch table, across from a woman who appeared to be eating alone. Her name was Gloria – or around those parts, “Outspoken Gloria” as I would shortly find out. She was open enough to conversing with a total stranger, and we began talking about her working union and the medical benefits she was hoping would be extended throughout her retirement. This led her to the point that she spent many a conversations making: young people, such as myself, do not understand the world and what is worth fighting for.
Gloria protested the war, she grew up with Kennedy’s hopeful voice booming from the television, she knows what it means to take a stand in defense of life’s most precious goods.
“You and your generation don’t know anything about that,” she declared, looking me dead in the eyes.
I felt like I was on trial, without any clear certainty of my crime.
“People don’t even attempt to buy American,” she continued.
“Well, is that not complicated by the fact that we are living in a global market these days?” I inquired.
Gloria paused as if she had heard the most foul, untruthful statement imaginable.
“We are not living in a global market. You just here that phrase being thrown around like a sound bite, so you young people adopt it without any real knowledge of how the market works. We had to work and fight to get companies into overseas markets. No one just invites companies in like its some ‘global market.’ You need to pick up a book and educate yourself,” she snapped.
Well, that’s great, I thought to myself, four years pouring over a wide range of humanities studies and this woman is telling me I need to pick up a book.
Although I am sure Gloria’s intent was noble, her delivery was plain insulting. The whole conversation was mired in resentment, ugly stereotyping and pessimistic charges against my generation. However, I knew that Gloria’s principal conviction ran deeper. She was attempting to impress upon me the importance of critical thinking, political and economic literacy, and a more rigorous education. And while I was pretty bothered by the conversation-turned-ruthless-indictment, I did see her point: I am in no way as connected to these social and political issues as she is and for that reason have sinned by omission. I am haunted by that prayer in mass, which asks forgiveness for sins- “In what I have done, and what I have failed to do.”
And so I asked her, “Gloria, what did you read or experience that helped you plug into these issues and see the importance of educating yourself further?”
Unfortunately, that question produced a very bizarre, circular conversation about when kids begin to read that led us nowhere. But at the end of it, Gloria did remind me of this very important reality: most of us are living the American dream, a life of wealth, commodities and privilege like we have never known before. Out of sheer gratitude for this abundance, we need to read up on where our power and possessions come from, whether it be from overseas markets or American companies and unions. If you appreciate something you want to protect it. Gratitude, then, was Gloria’s connecting point, her reason for reading, investing in and championing certain causes.
I think many of us are exposed to myriad political, social, and environmental issues that are altogether dizzying. The world is increasingly complex, and dare I say globally laced? It can be overwhelming just deciding where to begin and how to become involved. Baby-steps might include reading a variety of newspapers and magazines to heighten our awareness of world affairs. But in my own experience, I have learned that issues become compelling when there is a human face involved that can speak frankly about the reality of one’s struggles. Better still, is the invitation to engage with a community that is strategically facing issues that matter to them. For example, you would find incentive to educate yourself on the outsourcing of products when your company or union is directly affected by such commercial diplomacy. You would participate in your union’s protests, rallies, and campaigns when your future depends on it.
Gloria is right to insist that we come from extraordinary privilege. Sadly, part of that privilege blinds us from the harsher realities and injustices that the poor must confront daily. The very luxuries of our lives keep us insulated, ignorant and complacent, and if we never take the initiative to visit with people of different backgrounds and hear their frustrations, those frustrations will almost certainly remain a safe distance from our door.
If we want to know truth, or to figure out a reason to care, then we must seek out the poor. For there is a great divide between us, and the poor do not yet have the means to cross it. We must go to them. It is with these people that we grow closer to the honest, broken, wild pulse of life that is forever encircling us. I do not need to agree with everything Gloria says to be apart of her caring, or to be a person charged with conscience and compassion. I just need to visit people like Gloria to learn what's worth caring about from a perspective that is rooted in supple, human experience. These people connect me in ways my bourgeois culture would rather not acknowledge, for they are living without the anesthesia of material comforts. They are painfully more sensitive to the way things are. And I know that I am just barely on the cusp of that reality.
Thank you Maggi for returning us to what is important.
ReplyDeleteMuch gratitude to you.