Who Are the Tough Ones?

Homeless mom and son doing laundry and showering at a campground.

Dueling political parties make the news. Obama, Boehner & Co. standing tough. But that's not where the real toughness lies.

The toughest people in this country are those trying to survive and to help their families survive. I just heard from a young mom that I've known for about 20 years. She, her husband and their son live in a trailer in the south. Modest living by all accounts.

Her husband just got sick and is unable to work. She's fighting a kidney stone, carpel tunnel syndrome, depression, migraines, and probably a bunch of other things. Their little boy (for now) is OK.

She's going for outpatient surgery for the kidney stone and will report back to work the next day. "I've got to. We need the money," she stoically shared with me. "Our furnace needs replacing. Our winter heating bills are $600. My husband's grandparents, on a fixed income, took a loan so I could have this surgery. We can't get food stamps, even though our income is now $100 a month."

Could you cope with that load of tough stuff? I wouldn't trade places with her for anything. Her big fear is rejoining the ranks of homeless families, knowing from her childhood what that was like. That's when I met her--she, her mom and siblings stayed at the shelter I ran.

In another part of the country, a beleaguered mom with 6 young boys is trying to make ends meet. Her meager budget of child support and welfare isn't enough to cover their essentials. Logistically, she can't get a job--child care and transportation alone would break her. And besides...what jobs are out there? She's $1,000 behind on her water/gas bill. She's looking down the road to back-to-school time and knows she'll need money for her boys to be ready for school. Her beater truck guzzles what she can't afford. Electricity. Gas. Water. Kids' shoes. Food. Such choices.

These are 2 families. I'd bet my lunch money millions more like them gallantly struggle to survive. They're tough. Bootstraps long frayed, they have unlikely prospects for escaping their bleak situations. Sure miracles happen...but, really, in today's world?

We have money. The "we" is our country. Not just government either. A Baptist church in Orlando just collected millions to help homeless families. That's just in compassion-challenged Orlando.

On July 4th, in backyards, towns and metro areas across this country, bazillion bucks went up in loud smoke as we celebrated (?) our nation's birthday. We spend billions to pamper pets (as opposed to providing adequately for them). We chug billions worth of beverages that harm us. We devour billions of bad food. You get the point.

And the Dems and Reps duke it out over our nation's fiscal policy. But they don't give a rat's ass about the families struggling to survive, like the households I mentioned and the millions more like them.

If nothing else, we should channel our respect to where it's deserved--the countless invisible s-heroes and heroes who continue to struggle to keep their families' bodies and souls together. Spend 4-minutes listening to young experts on what it's like to be homeless, our My Own Four Walls documentary trailer. You'll understand and be inspired.

Seems to me that we should revise our tax code so Good Samaritans could get tax credits for bolstering the frazzled safety net of families across our country.  Then we'll need to learn a tough new way of living--helping our neighbor without government intervention. It's shutting down. Of course, that will make the tax code irrelevant. Sigh.

How Many Ways to Say 'We've Got a Problem'?

The old love poem starts, "How do I love you? Let me count the ways." I suggest an alternative, "How bad is homelessness among families and teens? Let me count noses..." and then I'd point to myriad ways the problem has been described....

Let's see...soaring, skyrocketing, surging, exploding, astronomical, rising, record levels...well, you get the point.

In the days of Phil Mangano (pre-Obama administration homelessness czar at the mic), we heard a great deal, ad nauseam, about the need for numbers to convince the administration that we have a problem. So, with a nationwide systemic effort, school districts began tallying, a homeless kid here, a homeless kid there.

Numbers, not my forte nor my favorite way of considering a problem that seems quite obvious, started adding up as this decade unfolded. 600k, 700k, and up. And then the econo-bubble burst and now we're up to more than a MILLION school kids, not counting pre-school or pre-adult siblings or parents. And that's just the kids identified. Some of us believe the million could truly be over 3 mil.

Every article I've seen, and I try to monitor nationwide news on this issue, refers to actual COUNTS of homeless kids in specific geographic areas of varying sizes--metro, suburban, rural--from Anchorage to Key West.

But now, with numbers "soaring, skyrocketing, surging, exploding, astronomical, rising, at record levels," our nation is distracted. Failed bombing attempt, Karl Rove's divorce, Charlie Sheen's probable divorce, you know, important things. Oh yeah, and the economy, health insurance, er, care, jobs....

Hey, that's not fair! We've counted. We've got lots of kids who don't know where they're going to lay their heads, eat their meals, find their mom/dad after school, do their homework; kids wondering if they'll get reunited with their friends from their old neighborhoods, get their pets back, get to try out for band or basketball. These kids count!

We're happy the McKinney-Vento Homeless Education Assistance Act gets/keeps them in school. And we've got a new and improved M-V bill that may someday make its way through Congress and become law. (To help, sign this petition to your Senator.)

HEAR US, my organization, works with schools and communities to help them identify and understand homelessness by letting them hear from the kids themselves, the experts. My Own Four Walls, our collection of documentaries (DVD), lets them rip on how it feels to be a kid without a home. They're powerful.

If we keep going the way we've been headed (no doubt we will), we'll have bunches of homelessness experts. Too many to count. And we'll have squandered the opportunity to make sure these kids had what they needed to be successful adults--simple things like a modest place to live with their families or on their own, adequate nutrition, health care. And we'll have a bumper crop of homeless adults.

Seems to me that between shenanigans and squandering, our nation is quite busy. Too busy to make sure homeless kids count? While the Obama administration is doing a little, it's way too little and will be too late if we don't ramp up those efforts NOW! Consider it a test of what's really important....

Good Ship USS USA Going Down?

Imagine a ship filled with passengers and crew, an adequate vessel owned by a wealthy, respected maritime corporation.

The ship fairly capably sails for a long time, and passengers and crew are mostly satisfied. But, unbeknownst to the passengers and the lower-ranking, least respected crew members—those who do the grungy grunt work—things are drastically changing.

Instead of plotting the course, the officers, including previous Captains, have spent a lot of time plotting how to have better accommodations and more control, at the expense of both passengers and the “non-essential” crew. This top-down systemic mutiny doesn’t happen with one swing of the sword, but as a gradual, noticeable change in the way things happen and how the ship's supplies are divvied up.

Soon it becomes apparent that because of the redistribution of space and materials, something has to give. With little fanfare, lowest ranking crew gets tossed overboard; then passengers, the least-affluent, up through the ranks. Finally, only the elite members of the crew remain and a handful of very lucky, and very wealthy, passengers who were able to buy their safety.

To say operations became dysfunctional is an understatement. Despite the need for crew and passengers for balance, the ship kept churning, although in erratic circles. Without adequate sailors and crew, the ship hits a hidden shoal, seriously damaging its hull. Abandon ship! Anarchy reigns....

The good ship USA is off course. Alienation is the norm. Thrashing, desperate former ship occupants and crew scramble to get on the lifeboats as the USS USA starts to list further to the right. The elite passengers and crew struggle to repel the invaders. With incredible help from the waterlogged masses, a new Captain, determined to rescue the ousted passengers and crew, fights his way on board and makes his way to the top deck.

Now what?

Take the above analogy and apply it to the current health care debate, or affordable housing/homelessness issues, racism, sexism, fair wages, environment, or any conundrum between the “haves” and the “have-nots.”

We're at a time in our country's history when more people are disenfranchised than ever. Homelessness among families, teens and single adults has blown off the charts. Poverty is spreading like wildfire thanks to those who schemed to gain control of even more money and power by sabotaging national and global economic engines.

Don't tell me that we CAN'T improve things. We can't afford to fail. Remember, we've managed to make progress on many essential issues, but every time we crawl onto the lifeboat we let some big brute stomp on our fingers and kick us off.

Seems to me that the only hope is for a strong voice of reason to be heard above the cacophonous cries of the self-interested mutineers. They need to walk the plank. Captain Obama and the masses need to get our mass-asses together and kick some ass. We may have to out-mutiny the mutineers....

NOTE: The New York Times ran a powerful op-ed column about poverty by Barbara Eherenreich, one of my s-heroes. It's worth reading, pondering and sharing! DDN

O Happy Day!

Where shall I spend Inauguration Day? That was my dilemma as I sat at a north Florida campground on Monday morning. To my freezing friends, sorry about the FL reference. And rest assured, it's been pretty darn cold here.

I looked at the map, knowing I was headed for Opelousas and Shreveport, LA. I picked out a route to take me across the shores of Mississippi, where I had never been, knowing a few state parks were scattered along the way. What about New Orleans?, I mused, looking at the map and seeing Bayou Segnette SP right next to NO.

As it happened, I landed here last night, and looked online for an Obama Inauguration day event, finding one at the "Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club," which in my non-NO state of mind thought it sounded like a brothel. After checking it out, I registered to attend, and plotted my route to include the free ferry (leaving my RV, Tillie, behind in the parking area).

Thanks to kind NO people and the efficient trolley-bus system, I arrived at Zulu early, in time for a front seat by the big screen TV. The room filled as the event unfolded. The energizing excitement at Zulu was dwarfed only by the millions on the Mall.

I couldn't believe my emotional state--sitting in front of a huge TV, surrounded by a crowd of strangers as excited as I was to be together, listening to a full-sentence-capable president extolling each one of us to shake off the sludge of despair and to realize the task of rebuilding our nation's greatness would be a task for all of us. My joy was enhanced as I released despair that I've seen in so many children, teens and adults who lost their place to call home.

Perhaps you'd like to visit the Zulu Club and watch me as I listened to President "Hope" Obama take the reins of this nation. I can tell you that I was feeling the inexplicable emotion that comes when you allow yourself to believe the rescue boat is about to come ashore. It's not over, nor will it be soon enough for the millions of children, teens and adults without homes. But perhaps we can try something new--comprehensively address poverty, involve those affected by the problem in the solution, and not be satisfied with the crumbs from the table usually tossed at the millions of homeless people in this country.

It seems to me that if not now, when?