If We Could Just Allow them to Dream: Poverty Is the Next and Most Urgent Battlefield

Photo credit: UrbanMinistry.org who is observing Blog Action Day

which is meant to bring about an awareness of poverty throughout the world

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world… --Ephesians 6:12

I grew up smack dab in the middle of the ‘hood. But though poverty surrounded us, I don’t remember us to be poor. I remember there were times of boom and bust. I remember there were times when we had a lot. And there were times when we had very little. However, whether we were going through boom or bust, my mother endeavored to give us good gifts.

And of all the gifts she gave us, perhaps the greatest gift was the ability, the encouragement to dream, to imagine a future far beyond the confines of the inner city, to believe that anything in the world was possible. Though we were raised in the ‘hood, the ‘hood never became a part of us or defined us; it was simply the place where we resided for the moment until that day when our dreams came true.

But as I now work with kids from the inner city, the first thing I notice is their inability to dream, or the very limited scope of their dreams. The first thing I notice is the gleam missing from their eyes.

Yesterday, I alluded to a book I spent the weekend re-reading, Dr. Ruby Payne’s A Framework for Understanding Poverty. One of Dr. Payne’s central tenets of the book is the notion that poverty engenders a certain mindset. She writes that for those caught in a seemingly endless cycle of generational poverty, the very first casualty is the ability to imagine a future any greater than the present; all that matters is the here and now.

I mentioned this to a colleague, and he summed up her argument thusly: Those caught in an endless cycle of poverty have basically given up hope. They have surrendered themselves up to the vicissitudes and whims of circumstance, and in this pernicious cauldron of hopelessness, it is the children who suffer most. If the children cannot imagine a future greater than the present, then no future exists for these children.

Though we still haven’t overcome or solved the issue of race, our next and most urgent battleground is poverty and the effects thereof. But the problem with confronting problem the problem of poverty and its effects is our attitude toward those languishing within its tenacious, insidious grip.

We have been conditioned by the politics of meritocracy to believe that those who work hardest, those who make the necessary investment in self are those who rise highest. In other words, those who are successful have worked hard for that success and fully deserve it. And I too subscribe to this belief.

However, we often are not aware of what is implied by this argument. If we accept this argument, we also tacitly accept the notion that those who are not successful, those mired in poverty, do not work hard and deserve to be in the very position they are in. Even further, I have heard it stated that many of those living in poverty actually enjoy that way of life.

But this is for the most part untrue. Many of those living in poverty work very hard, perhaps harder than most, but having a limited set of skills, they find themselves working the hardest, most menial jobs for the least amount of pay. Many deplore the lives they are forced to lead but simply know of no other way. Many have just thrown their hands up and given up altogether.

But whatever the reason, whatever the situation our greatest concern should be the children. Perhaps we cannot reach many of the adults. Perhaps the effects of poverty, perhaps the mindset of poverty has set in, become entrenched in many of the adults; however, in the children there remains a glimmer of hope. Not only that, if we are successful in reaching the children, if we are successful in meeting the needs of the children, we can then get many of the adults to come to the fence.

Every person wants to give their children good gifts. Every person wants to pass on to the next generation those advantages that they did not have. The greatest gift we can give our children, the greatest advantage we can pass on to the next generation is the ability to dream, the encouragement to dream, to imagine a future greater than the present. In that way, we can actually offer them a future.

I Am Going to Build Me a Home: Finding a New Purpose

Forgive me if I speak in metaphors and allegories, but for some reason, this is how I have begun to view the world; this is how everything comes to me lately.

But every now and then I find myself having to step back, re-survey the landscape, get my bearings and begin anew. Right now, I am at that place.

I know it sounds rather cliché to say, but it seems like only yesterday that my two children left at home were only babies. Then, our goals were simple. We had only to raise these two children to adulthood while putting aside a little here and a little there to assure that they would be able to attend college.

For so long this is the end toward which we have been working. For so long this has been our purpose in life.

But now the children are older, and we have almost met those two goals. Pretty soon the two of them will be off to college leaving the two of us to our own devices. What do we do then? What will be our purpose? This is what my wife asked me as my head rested on the pillow awaiting sleep. And I really wished she had not done so because then sleep would not come. I instead spent the night staring into the darkness and contemplating this question.

However, toward morning a narrative came to mind. Toward morning an old image returned.

As the story was related to me, my grandfather began his adult, married life sharecropping on the very land on which his family, my ancestors, were held as slaves. However, the white owner, who was incidentally his great uncle, was so impressed by his work ethic and mental acumen that he promised to bequeath him the little house he had built for his family, and the bit of land he occupied at the time.

You can probably guess what happened next. Upon the landowner’s death, his heir, my grandfather’s cousin, refused to honor the agreement. He insisted instead that his father had left my grandfather the house, but not the land.

My grandfather responded by taking a job on the graveyard shift at a new manufacturing plant that had just opened in Milan, Tennessee. So, by day he dutifully worked the little piece of farmland that was his responsibility, and by night he worked as a factory worker.

He did this until he had amassed enough money to buy his own land elsewhere. And when that day came, he and a few of his relatives broke the house into manageable pieces, loaded it onto the back of a flatbed truck, and moved the house onto his new property.

During the years following that move, he continued to build and add to that little house little by little, piecemeal by piecemeal. With what little money he earned, he purchased lumber and other things he needed, and he bartered and traded for labor. With the help of his sons and relatives, he managed to add a second story as well as additional bedrooms. In fact, he worked on that house up until the eve of his death, and with the insurance my grandmother received, she finished the work he had started.

I remember playing in the yard one day as he and my great-great uncle El Duffie worked on some part of the house. Being the curious, precocious child that I was, I sauntered over and asked him what he was doing.

He responded with, “I’m building a home.”

I responded with a question. “You are building a house?”

He patiently answered, “No, I’m building a home.”

He went on to try to explain the difference between a house and a home, a distinction which was lost on me then. He explained that he wanted to provide a place of relative comfort and safety for his wife and children and me. He went on to say that long after his children left his home, he wanted them to have a place to return to, a place filled with loving memories that would always call them, beckon them back.

And he added that he wanted to build a home to which I, too, would always want to return, to which I would want to bring my children and my grandchildren so that they might know a place of respite, a place of relative comfort and safety to which they might bring their children and grandchildren and so on.

My grandfather has passed away. And recently my grandmother passed away. But that home still stands, and I still possess my key. I return there as often as time permits. And no matter how low I am, no matter how life has beaten me down, joy comes from just stepping foot on the grounds. My strength is renewed by the musty smell of years and years of life and living. I am inspired by the memories that reside there.

I have written often of what that house still means to me, most recently here.

So, today I shall begin working toward a new goal. I have found my purpose. I am going to build me a home.

Brother, please call me when you get this message

My younger brother L.G. Reddick of whom I am very proud.

Brother, please call me when you get this message. I really need to speak with you right now.

I called your home phone, but there was no answer. And when I called your cell, your message box was full.

I originally meant to have a little fun this morning at your expense. I was going to clown you.

I was digging through photo albums searching for those pictures you took when you came down that time, and we threw you an impromptu birthday party. Do you remember those? You were wearing a suede vest with no shirt underneath, and it was about a hundred degrees outside, and everyone was laughing and trying to make sense of it all.

But then, as I was looking, a stack of old photographs of our grandparents and many of our aunts and uncles cascaded to the floor. And as I picked them up, it suddenly dawned on me that many of them are no longer with us.

Our grandparents are gone. Our grandparents’ sisters and brothers are gone except for only one or two. And our parents and aunts and uncles are aging quickly.

Not until Grandmother’s funeral did I notice how completely mother and father had grayed. Only then did I notice how slowly they moved, how they needed assistance to sit down, to get up, to move about.

Only then did I notice our eldest uncle’s hands. As he sat there in the wheelchair, his body ravaged by a stroke, my eyes were drawn to his hands. And those long beautiful black fingers that had gained mastery over the piano keyboard were drawn and gnarled into unrecognizable, unusable hooks. The deep baritone voice that had entertained so many for so long was now reduced to a whisper. And that sharp mind and wit struggled to find an answer to the most mundane of questions.

And shamefully I turned away. Shamefully, I tried to avoid him. But my heart was broken, and it was all that I could do to keep from breaking down, to keep from weeping like a child who has been cast away.

The seasons are quickly changing. And the protecting canopy of the leaves in the uppermost branches is changing colors, drying up and falling away. And soon, sooner perhaps than I would like to imagine, we will have to assume their position, their roles, at the very top of the tree, and this frightens me. This causes me untold anxiety.

How can I ever be the men our grandfathers were? How can I ever be the men our uncles are? The awesomeness of the responsibility of trying to replace them, of trying to become them is daunting indeed.

Right before Grandmother passed, she told me that soon I would have to stop running from reality. She told me than soon I would have to stop hiding in books. Soon I would have to deal with something other than characters I invented and could easily manipulate, plots and storylines over which I had complete control.

She told me that as the eldest child, as the eldest grandson, soon I would have to return home and assume my place of leadership within the family, and she chastised me for having left you with the responsibility for so long.

But you were always the more courageous brother. You were always the stronger brother. While I fled from trial, from tribulation, you faced it head on. While I always sought compromise, you stood steadfast.

But Grandmother was right. Soon I must return home. I feel the tug and I hear the call wresting me from my place of security.

I now know what I have to do, but I feel I lack the courage, the strength to proceed. And I am frightened and filled with great trepidation. Please lend me your strength, your courage so that I might complete this task.

And please, brother, just call me when you get this message. I have tried desperately to get in touch with you all morning, and I cannot. And I really need to speak to you right now.