Bread

On a walk around our block yesterday, Mae asked me why there are loafs of bread hanging on the fence on 9th Street.  I told her it’s because some people who live around here don’t have enough food to eat so people drop off donations.  She knew the bread wasn’t for us and scootered off.  Mae had the same reaction that I did, it was just to walk away without giving it a second thought.  I stood there for a second and wanted to take it in, that people in my neighborhood use that food.

I can’t relate to grabbing a loaf of bread on a fence and being thankful.

One of my neighbors told me how much she appreciates the food that was dropped off there.  A man I met at the community garden asked if I knew when more food would be dropped off over there.  I keep thinking of the statistic that 2/3 of the people in 53206 are in poverty.  That means 2 out of 3 people I meet, could not have enough to eat.  2 out of 3 kids go to bed hungry.

To me, this is so un-relatable that I can’t even grasp what that means.  I can’t relate.  I go to the grocery store if I need one thing, just one thing.  I have been thinking a lot about what it is like to live in poverty.  Something as simple as a loaf of bread helps families in my neighborhood.  It makes me wonder how we got to this point that many in our society don’t have enough to keep them full.  There are lots of questions around that but if you take a look empathetically, our society was built with only the thriving in mind and many people were left out of those thoughts.  Many people are still benefiting from systemic racism and this bread on the fence is a real way we can see that played out.