Mike and I did a presentation today and one of the questions was, "Why do you do the work you do?" It's a good questions for me to think about, it lets me articulate the values I learned growing up and the example my parents were to me and why I think it's wrong for anyone to be hungry. I've never put Jacob to bed hungry and I've never had to tell him no to a second glass of milk. The issue of hunger for me personally is really just theoretical. But today, really- I got this call today about 4:30 p.m. after a day of meetings.
I answered the phone and wasn't sure if anyone was there, there was a delay to my greeting, then I heard a little voice.
I'm not sure how old she was, but she wasn't older than 11 or 12. "Hi, can you tell me how we can get some food?" When young kids call it's usually because the parents don't speak English. I asked her a couple of routine questions and then gave her the information about some pantries. They don't have a car, and have to depend on a neighbor for rides. She was nervous and had me repeat he information a couple of times. I asked her about food stamps, they don't have papers and no one in the family was born in the U.S. Okay, there's always school lunch, but she's not in school, not since they moved to Utah, but she's going soon.
So what's next, "Have you eaten today?", I ask. A short pause later she responds, " A roll earlier, but not much." Shit, she needs food tonight and it's almost 5:00-soup kitchens. I give her the information about the soup kitchen, this feels so icky! Then I remind her of the times she and her family can go get food tomorrow. She asks if it is free, I tell her yes and if they can get a ride they can eat tonight. I asked for her address and asked if it was okay to send her some information. She hesitated, I told her I didn't care if she had papers but that I just wanted to send her information about some other resources. She gave me the information and I asked her if she felt okay about telling me her name. Her name is Deni.
Tonight the US. Senate is poised to vote on two budget measures, both these budgets cut deeply into low-income programs and both offer tax cuts to very wealthy Americans. I bet, I just bet that most wealthy people would take a smaller tax cut so that programs like The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TFAP), which gives food to emergency food pantries, wouldn't be facing as much as a 20% cut in funding. So, that in turn Deni can make her way to a line, where she will have have to tell someone she is hungry and that she needs help.
