Within the past year I’ve seen the many faces of homelessness and hunger. I’ve talked with those needing that helping hand, as well as those who gave it. I’ve listened to people who believe those caught in the struggle are there due to their own choices and decisions. While sometimes that is the case, I still question those who believe anyone would truly want to live that way. How many children grow up saying “I want to be homeless or hungry”. Worse yet, how many of them grew up knowing they would be affected by mental illness and or substance abuse?
Yes, there are those stand on the corner daily asking for a hand out and when we see this, it makes you wonder why they don’t just go get a job, or they are out there hustling people. Other times it causes you to think that they are just going to use it to buy drugs and alcohol with it. While each of these scenarios maybe true, this is only a small percentage of what hunger and homelessness is. What you don’t see is the person who works day in and day out on a job that barely pays enough for them to pay rent and feed their family. They have to make hard choices everyday because one day off of work and their world collapses. Car breaks down (world crumbles); child gets sick (world crumbles); bills overdue (world crumbles); pay to get to work or buy food (world crumbles); bad weather means no work (world crumbles); major illness and no insurance (world crumbles); criminal past means no job (world crumbles); landlord forecloses on house you rent (world crumbles); divorce (world crumbles). The list could go on and on, but the fact is there are plenty life events that makes a person’s world crumble. Unfortunately when we see it its too late-their world has come crashing down.
