Heavy, hard, and struggle

The struggle is real you guys. I use this phrase in jest mostly because it had become so overused to describe the most benign of situations. Nicholas Kristof wrote an article over the weekend, and I didn’t hate it. I know, take a minute.

The article, entitled “Is a hard life inherited?” resonated with me, and many of my peers with similar backgrounds. Of course, there was some mockery, after all yes, yes it is. And everyone who came up a certain way knows that. There is a tenuous balance to keep everything going. I’m firmly in the luck camp of things…not everyone is, but you don’t have what you have because you did something to deserve it. You have what you have from the ever interconnecting and competing privileges and oppressions.

Kristof’s article was far from perfect. In fact after reading it, I was like yeah, I agree so what is it that I don’t like about this? Kristof profiles a man from his hometown. It is a good profile, I think Rick—said man—is fine with how he was portrayed. Rick’s story should be told. Everyone’s story should be told if they want to share it. Additionally, Rick faces the struggle; he has a criminal record which prevents him from a lot of employment. Add that to the fall of unions, which a generation ago would have been a strong beneficent force in this community, and of course, we have to acknowledge the importance of a living wage. Finally, we have to witness drug use and those ties to poverty. I guess my problem is Kristof doesn’t acknowledge the privileges Rick has in a substantial way.

I’m not fan of the oppression Olympics, but I think Rick was a strategic choice. A single woman would probably have kids and thus be a welfare mom—Rick has kids, but their mom ran out on him. Will anyone other than the Baltimore Sun write about black men with convictions and heroin addictions? Probably not. Then again, from a storytelling perspective, the white man’s story is still the human story. We’re all supposed to understand and empathize with it.

All that said, the article is good, and you should read it if you haven’t already. But let me tell you about heavy, hard, and struggle. I had to stop recording a 50 year old woman when I was gathering data for my Master’s thesis. She was sobbing about fear of the unknown—well known and unknown. You see she was about to hit the 60 month time limit for TANF in Ohio. She, her husband, and eight children were going to lose the only cash income coming into the house. Fear of loss is known, and the fear of what was coming is the unknown. She described it as a struggle. Not the loss of the benefit, everyday, the existing was the struggle. She said she never cries at home because he husband is disabled, and she doesn’t want to worry him or the kids. I know what it is like to hide my emotions, but that I can’t imagine.

"It's hard" was a refrain with the women I interviewed. But I can hear the women in my family saying it too. I can't think of any examples, but it sounds like something my Nanny would have said, that's what we called my maternal grandmother. And of course, keeping with the depressing family sayings we have: life's hard then you die. The Irish, man. Sometimes I think it is what keeps people getting up and going, knowing that things aren't supposed to be easy. That you have to earn it (LeBron wasn't the first to say it). But living like that, it wears you down. Poor people are always exhausted, part of me thinks it is the goal of capitalism to keep the laborers to exhausted to rise up. 

Heavy are the burdens we bare. I read The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien when I was a freshman at Carroll. I have trouble remember all of it now. But I remember the physical and emotional burdens in war as presented in text, and remember wondering what the things they carried would be back home. If memory serves, there was also a theme about fear and shame as motivational factors. The women I interviewed, and the men I served, I could tell you what they carried without complaint. And when asked, about trying to find work, with a child under three who needs care, and without reliable transport, a woman would say heavy, hard, and struggle. Finding a job after incarceration and trying to handle your responsibilities? Heavy, hard, and struggle. The shame associated with needing help, taking cash benefits, food from strangers? Heavy, hard, and struggle.

Kristof, per usual, doesn’t address the structural and systematic aspects to poverty. Because, yes, of course, we inherit it from our parents like we inherit all kinds of things like my skin tone and dazzling personality. And there is something to be said for bursting the American myth that if you work just a little more, a little harder than you can win. We don’t get to win. Not the way the game is played now. V and I had this great talk over the weekend about that. You can look forward or backward but not to the side and therefore we can’t imagine what something else would look like so we’re stuck with capitalism, the current criminal justice system, etc. We’ll have to wait for the revolution, and hope those who lead it will be able to look to the side, but I can’t.