Tears of futility trickled in hot watery tracks down my face as I realized the inadequacy of my token offering to Debbie. I wondered how many other marginalized American women and families were hanging on to the American dream by a thread. How many more have run out of resources, or never had means to begin with, yet have not given up the daily struggle up and out from under their miserable situations? With all odds against them and more waiting in the wings, they fight with incredible strength. Why, I pondered, why are so many given so much only to squander it when at the same time so many do intelligent, honorable good with nothing? In this America, this proverbial land of milk and honey where poverty and destitution should be impossible, there is an unsightly epidemic silently spreading. Its name is apathy. And it is slowly but surely killing us like a long undetected cancer.
I have heard of the working poor, casualties of broken social systems, inept government, or abandoned spouses and parents, but until Debbie I’d never really seen the magnitude of a daily struggle for survival when your main source of security is pulled out from under you. I had not witnessed the one-step-forward, two-steps-back stumble of constant advancement and defeat. In her story is the story of the silent majority who follow the rules, don’t live off the system, honor a work ethic, fully intend to support themselves, and despite it all, fail.
These are not the disaster victims you hear about on the news. These are not the welfare children you read about in the paper. They are not the wounded vets you see on the busy intersection begging for change, or the homeless clustered on city streets staring with an in-your-face look at poverty that appears somehow, despite everything we have in this country, out of the realm of possibility for the average person. These are the people slipping through the cracks against all odds, and they need their story told.
So, I decided, I am going to tell it. I am going to get my hands dirty. I am going to get off the sidelines, or at least try. Why? I can only answer that question with two more. “If not you, who?” and “If not now, when?”
Next: Part IV: Stepping Into the Crack (Debbie’s Story Continued)
