"Can you help me get some money for some food?", she asked me.
She was young, probably in her twenties. She wasn't poorly dressed, as the stereotypes would insist. I know what many would think, a young, poor African American woman has almost 300 years of negative connotations associated with her in America. As a resident of New York City it is easy to develop blind spots to the things we do not want to see, things like poverty and suffering, it would have been very easy for me to walk by and not even make eye contact, but because of my rural upbringing I reflexively look in someone's eyes when they address me.
"I'm sorry, I'm broke." I replied, but it was a lie, and I knew it. After a few steps I paused.
I am not broke. I am in the same boat as this woman, the U.S.S. Proletariat, we just sit in different sections. I have only a little money left and I have no idea where the rent money is coming from for next month, but I am not totally broke, not yet, and thus I am still able to afford meals for myself and other necessities. I shall admit, I am an irrational person who makes poor decisions. With the few dollars I have I decided to help this person whose name I do not know. My taxes are not so high that I can not afford to have a human heart.
So I ducked into a local bakery, not more than a block down the street from my room. They have a basket of goods by the front door marked 2 for $1 which I have utilized on many occasion, as stale bread is just as filling as fresh bread in these years of wind and salt. For a moment I felt ashamed, shame for my initial reaction with the face of poverty worn by this woman, shame for my own poverty, shame for my inability to help her in anything more than a small gesture, but then I realized, this is what love is, love is a gift you give, love is the part of you that makes you human, if we lose that nothing else matters, and as I seek my own love I must be that better man.
Giving the woman the bag as I passed her on the street I told her "There are pastries and muffins in here. I hope this helps"
And she said "God bless you."
And I walked away, but being the sentimental fool that I am I turned back something which I can no longer recall. I amounted to "We are in this together, we have to help each other."
. . . .
And now I type, moments later, thinking that this is why I fight, so that we need not be destitute and without help, alone as a rugged individual with nothing but bootstraps to our name if that is what fate wills for us, while those who are born into wealth tell us they can not afford to feed their fellow countrymen, that our soldiers must fight but we can not afford to guarantee their children's retirement, that our mothers and sisters and daughters must go without the healthcare they need, we can't afford it, we can't print any more money, we're going broke, it's all bullshit, and that is why I fight, because I want to make things better for all Americans, for all people, not just the ones who can afford to pay. If we don't have the money to make sure that every American can afford to eat three times a day than we as a nation have become morally bankrupt. I will not be that person, I will not be that man that tells those less fortunate than I to piss off, because I am hardly more fortunate than they are, and even if I were I would gladly pay a little bit more to keep my countrymen safe and secure, to do otherwise is unpatriotic. Nationalism, however, takes a second place to humanity, and it is this question that we must ask ourselves as a nation, what is more important, that 300 million Americans can have a future with homes that they own and can afford, good jobs, a retirement, healthcare and education for our children, or a country where 300,000 millionaires get to keep their tax bailouts forever?
Imagine a country with money for prisons but not schools, a country with money for war but not healthcare, a country where the rich get every break and the rest of us have to make every sacrifice. Can you name one thing that the super-rich have sacrificed since Bush v Gore? If you said "The Democratic Process", you would be correct.
Imagine a country where corporations are people but gay families are not. Imagine a country where corporations have the right to unlimited free speech but a congressman's constituents do not. Imagine a country where economic freedom means that you have the freedom to starve to death sick under a bridge if you please and the corporations have the freedom to rob you as they please.
If you want to fight back against the dreamworld of the men who care for money more than humanity you have to get involved.
So the next time there is a pie fight and you are ready to write that angry comment/diary to so and so about whathisname or thisandthat, ask yourself, Is there something more productive for the causes I believe in that I could be doing instead? As our own blessed Meteor Blades said in last diary . . .
In fact, much more would be accomplished if just half the energy that goes into this internal battling went into the real activism
I sincerely hope that we hear from MB again soon.
We should be working together. How can we possibly succeed if we do not work together and unite against our common enemies, those that would rob us and starve us, for the enemies of the working class are indeed united in their hatred for us.
So ask yourself, what can you do to make things better? What can you do to advance the causes you care about and the basic human rights we all deserve? Though I can not claim so much as to chide others in that my simple act today can be captured within a brown paper bag, it's a start, right? And if I can help just one person, even if it is just that one woman who was hungry, maybe that is how things begin to get better, one act of kindness at a time.
It's a big hard sun we live under in a big hard world. I want to make it better, for myself and for the other lives around me, that is what I want to fight for, that is what I want to live for. I see the woman and can read the unspoken words, the suffering, the shame. Things need not be this way, that many should sacrifice so a few may feast. Now tell me what we can do about it.
I want to weep for my countrymen.
I saw the best minds of my generation
destroyed by
madness,
a heartless howling beast
demanding lower taxes and permanent record profits
You can follow me on the twitter machine at @JesseLaGreca