Colleges have courses about poverty. Departments and entire research portfolios aimed at studying what poverty is and why it exists… and what to do about it. I've been preparing to teach HEA 447- Health Income and Social Status to 35 undergraduates at a university. Most are in their final semesters of earning their degrees in health-related disciplines.
Every college course is required to have a syllabus. Every time I teach this class I update the syllabus just a bit- applying lessons of epic failures to the next cohort of students. Praying my ego is not too damaged in the process of falling from intelligence and grace.
What qualifies someone to teach a college class on poverty?
A PhD.
What must we know to solve the most wicked problem of our time?
Poverty is the driver of nearly every health inequity and disparity. Generational poverty is similar to generational wealth- once you are born into it, you stay for a while. Sometimes your entire life, your children’s lives, and their children’s grandchildren’s lives. You get the idea.
Can you teach a class on poverty without the lived experience?
Can you know true poverty without having the history of waking up without food and water- in a car with steamed-over windows and an empty gas tank? The cops knocking on the doors- telling you it’s against the law to park overnight… you must move somewhere else. Getting ready for work in a McDonalds restroom. There’s no extra money to be a customer. Stares. Pity. Shame. These are a few observations remembered.
Can you teach what it’s like to live on $50 a month for groceries in the year 2000?
Too proud for government assistance, eating food in dented rejected cans from the warehouse in the ghetto part of town. Car insurance, doctor appointments, medicines, cars, vacations, phones, movies, new clothes, eating out...you don’t think about having these luxuries because they are simply not possible with minimum-wage jobs.
I know a bit about poverty.
My grandma told me it’s not a shame to be poor, but it is a shame to be dirty. “Take care of what you have. Clean up. Do your best,” she would say.
My Indigenous relatives tell me poverty is when you don’t have any family or relatives.
When you experience poverty, you know not to judge those still in it. People are doing the best they can. Poverty is the visible consequence of failed promises, policies, programs, and people. Look around. You can see the consequences of poverty everywhere. Here is just one story.
She lives in an old mechanics garage. No plumbing, broken windows, missing walls, dirt floors. It’s a maze of old tools, boxes, broken exercise equipment, musical instruments, clothes, and once-treasured items- now fit for the landfill. I bring her an iced tea with a straw, she throws the wrapper down on the ground- no sense in picking it up.
We visit.
I observe that living in poverty is hard work. It’s about surviving not getting ahead. Life becomes a series of forced choices about food, gas, and transportation- survival. People come out of the walls, homeless ones, family, old friends- all sharing a life of poverty. A life of not enough.
Our picnic is a circle of chairs and a table with empty pizza boxes and partially empty bags of chips. The son in charge of the food has taken the money to buy weed. Too bad we can’t drink the weed on a hot day I think.
The baby sleeps in a hot shed. I think to myself… this baby is coming into a world not enough for her sacredness. After several hours I go check- she’s still sleeping. Maybe it’s easier to ignore the hardship of poverty I think. Babies must know, even at 60 days old.
Evening comes. It’s getting dark. More people come.
They’re here for the weed.
Driving away, I have some clarity about poverty. I start thinking about addiction and numbing. I want to know if the addiction helps manage the stress of poverty- even for a short while. I want to know if these people had access to generational wealth, would they still be numbing with drugs?
I tell my mentor an abbreviated version of this story. She says they are just in love with the way drugs make them feel. Not the drug. This might be true, but what does this mean about poverty?
Poverty can make people feel hopeless. Depressed. Overwhelmed. Anxious. Disconnected. Invisible. Shame.
Research tells us these are some effective programs and interventions addressing poverty.
There are more…
Do we need research to tell us what we intuitively know?
That’s the question I’ve been tossing around lately.
Final thoughts
If we can address poverty, I believe we can change the world and seven generations. That is the goal of this teaching class and learning about poverty. You might never live in poverty. This means you are privileged. Privilege is what we give away to bring others into the circle of abundance.
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