View from a Food Closet in Rural America by Sydney Avey I serve at the front lines in the war on poverty. As a volunteer in a food closet in small town America, I see we are losing ground. Our church serves as the venue and pair of hands for the county’s monthly food bank distribution. It isn’t that we are running out of food to hand out, it’s that people who have been scraping by are running out of options. In addition to our regulars, we are starting to see families that have left the homes they lost to foreclosure. They are coming to our underserved mountain community where transportation and jobs are non-existent. Our number of new applicants is growing as new families pass through or try to establish themselves in our community. Some say that the memory of a peaceful community they once lived in draws them back. Others come because a friend or relation can provide space in a corner of a house or shelter in an RV under the pines. Some of our new residents come to the Friday food closet with school-age children in tow. When I ask about the children, they say they are homeschooling. I can’t help thinking that it’s unlikely these children will learn what they need to know from parents who are stressed just to put food on the table. It’s not easy to keep up a regimen of selfdirected study if you live in an RV with no power. I worry about this. Finding common ground The only time I see my poorer neighbors is when I help at the food closet. I sit at a table, greet them as they come through the door and answer their questions. If I put a couple of chairs next to mine and pick up my needlework they will sit down beside me. Working with my hands calms my heart and invites conversation. Like any group of people, some face their difficulties with courage and a smile. Others wrestle multiple demons that wear them down. What I see is often upsetting—the ravages of addiction and mental illness, the pain of untreated or untreatable physical illness, the idleness of young people who have no hope of employment. Then there are the industrious folks who touch my heart with their cheerfulness despite their circumstances. Some come into the church kitchen and bake the cookies that we serve to the people who are waiting to go downstairs to get their bags of groceries. Others sit down at a table and fold the bulletins for a Sunday service they don’t attend. Still others pick up a broom and sweep acorns off the walk outside so people won’t slip and fall. They do this without being asked.
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