The forgotten ones

• Feast countdown = 38
• Cravings for the past 3 Sundays = Blizzards at DQ
• Craving distractions = Work^3, along with good company

Poverty looks very different in rural Missouri than it does in metro Atlanta.  That probably sounds fairly obvious to anyone, but I still find myself surprised that some of the neediest people tend to fade into the background here.  In the cities, it is exactly the opposite – the concentration of people naturally brings about a visible and frequent contrast between the haves and have-nots, oftentimes in the most heavily trafficked areas.  Every time I ran in Piedmont Park, I expected to pass a series of homeless people curled up on park benches.  Or I expected to smell the stench of urine when I walked to work on the downtown streets.

Out here, it seems easier to hide and ignore.  Just the other day, I asked one of my teammates from this area about homelessness -- mostly because I hadn't seen it -- and he paused for a moment before answering that it isn’t the best metric for neediness here.  Some of the poorest people scrape by in an old car or abandoned trailer, because they are afforded the vast space and limited oversight to tuck themselves away in the hills.  They may have a home, but they are just as needy as the street corner dwellers.

The reason this strikes me is that I live in one of the poorest Congressional districts in the U.S. – 428 out of 435 for median income in 2008 – and yet I don’t bump into this harsh reality as frequently as I thought I would.  It’s much more subtle.  I’ve caught myself several times admiring a pristine stretch of pastures and pastoral landscape as I drive by, only glimpsing at the rusty trailer in its midst as an afterthought.  "Wait, somebody lives there...", I remind myself.  While no one is approaching my car for money or gazing at me from the curb as I walk, poverty still hides in the periphery and shrinks from the public eye.

I hate the thought of children growing up in an environment that feels forgotten.  As areas like these hemorrhage jobs and young talent, the next generation of rural America is left with little resources, or ambition, to turn things around.  These children place their future in failing school systems and dying factories, not to mention a way of life that isn’t sustainable in the long run.  Many of their parents’ careers are no longer there for the taking, or they are nothing like what they used to be. 

I have to remind myself of the "veil of ignorance" mindset: If raised in similar conditions myself, I don’t know if I would be a strong enough person to fight my way to a better life.  

Unfortunately, I don’t have any brilliant solutions to offer yet -- just my observations and musings for the time being.  The realist in me resigns to the fact that rural America will probably shrivel up for many years as we continue expanding into the global economy.  The idealist, however, looks to education and visionary public leadership as the vehicles for change.  I want to believe that people can innovate and adapt when pressed into it.  Time will tell, but I can only hope that I’m helping to bring about that tide of change for a slice of Missouri.