Tonight started off with a frustrating trip to the grocery store & then inspiration by a tweet from someone saying how "Many Americans don’t know what “no food” really looks like." And that really hit home. And I think that is at the root of my chill mode about this whole thing.
Some of you have read me rant about this before. My parents lived under communism and I was born and lived under a dictatorship for my first 10 years. Times were tough. One of my first memories is of being hungry. And not like dinner is 30 minutes lates hungry.
More like it's been 3 days and mom hasn't been able to find anything to feed us. The last thing in the pantry was rotten and we tried to eat it but couldn't kind of hungry. Tonight, I went to the grocery store and the toilet paper was gone, the rice, flour bread, gone.
But when I asked when they'll restock the shelves, they said tomorrow. My first memory of being hungry for days doesn't include any shelves restocking. It includes the uncertainty of when, if ever, your next meal will come from.
The grocery store today was full of SO MANY THINGS available at my disposal if I were really in a dire situation that called for anything for my survival. All this led to a conversation with my kids about what it really means to be in need.
And about how to be prepared to take care of ourselves because no one else is responsible for us but us. And how people will take advantage of difficult situations and vulnerable people to advance their agendas under the guise of caring for you.
We talked about the goodness of people who have always helped those in need when no one is watching, and about the opportunists who pretend to care and want you to cast all your cares aside by signing over your soul to the government.
All that from coronavirus and a trip to the grocery store. Today was a good day.
