At times we forget the disparity between rich and poor. Sometimes the disparity between making it and falling between the cracks is slim to none, and for those not wavering on the edge of the abyss, there is only ignorance.
This week, a friend and I undertook the task to check out the local food banks. We did so predominately out of curiosity and with only a couple questions in mind. First, where are the food banks? Second, what do you get there? My dear friend (we shall call her Wif, for she is and has been my BFF and Wif for years) heard about a place down in Oakland -- in East Oakland, to be exact, somewhere near 16th and 27th Ave, only a few blocks above International Blvd. This is not what most would consider a decent neighborhood, though driving through, the houses are mostly early 20th century with a few 1960's style apartment complexes. By appearances, the neighbor, though rundown, is relatively well-kept. Not in the way one expects from the Middle Class, for sure, but yards are generally neat, the streets not littered in trash, and the overall ambiance not overtly hostile or even scary. At least by my estimation, and granted I don't live there, and probably wouldn't wander around there at night, but it's not that bad. Really.
The small church on the corner was passing out numbered tickets when arrived at noon, the time at which we had been told. We were given numbers 108 & 109. A slim, woman anywhere from 20 to 40 years old walked up the street as we were leaving, cup of coffee in a to-go cup in hand. She commented how lucky we were to have a car, as she'd walked from MacArthur Boulevard. This is a fairly substantial walk, by my estimation, at least a few miles away.
Told the handout wouldn't begin for another hour or so, we came back later to a diverse crowd of hispanics, blacks and a number of Chinese people, along with one toothless and rather ancient East Indian woman, mobilized outside the black iron fence of the church. An older gentlemen in an "Obama: Time for Change" t-shirt began calling numbers, starting at one. This was to form us into an orderly line in numerical order. People were examining each others number stub, which seemed to me pointless, since if you were number 100, you'd still have to wait behind 99 others, but for a few this was their agenda, that they must know who had what numbers. It may be simply human nature to figure out where you stand in the whole scheme of things, whether or not you were in a better or lesser position compared to others.
The line started inching along, one person after another. Wif noted that people seemed to be moving awfully slowly, also commenting that this was the day's excursion. If you don't have a job, you don't have money but you have time and this was a kind of social event. Small groups of people knew each other, many just stood quietly alone. A few looked haggard and broken, hung over or just beat down by life. another few held cans in paper bags, one guy had two empty OE8 cans crushed in his battered suit jacket pocket. As people moved up the street with their bag of groceries, others peered in to see what they got. An older woman we spoke with said she was waiting for the bread, 'cause she didn't have any at home and had a houseful of family with no jobs who ate what food there was. She said she mixed the can vegetables she got to make soup, was pissed off that her husband was eating all her microwave popcorn, and that her daughter broke into her personal box of cereal. She was happy to see that ice cream was on the listed of grocery items.
By the time my number came up, I had grown weary of waiting. Surely, the bag of groceries would compensate. Here is the list of groceries, more or less the same bag was given to everyone:
A ziplock bag of some kind of sesame seed mixture. Some people got sage, vanilla or pepper.
1 pint of Dreyer's Reese's peanut butter ice-cream.
Bread items: I got generic English muffins and a bag of hamburger buns.
A sack of 5 or 6 potatoes.
1 can of green beans
1 can of baked beans
1 can of pinto beans in tomato sauce
1 can of off-brand chicken noodle soup
1 sweet potato
1 package of "Lunchables"
a plastic baggie of white rice
1 lb pinto beans
1 can of USDA beef stew
I gave my ice cream and bag of muffins to a Hispanic woman with four kids. The hamburger buns went to the older woman who wanted bread. Wif gave her another loaf of Safeway brand bread.
