When beginning here today my first inclination was to write a piece titled “I am not broken” in reference to myself. I find images can be inspiring, wake feelings within and focus my attention so I often find a few that are good catalysts for the day’s subject. When I searched Google Images for photos relating to not being broken, I was unprepared for what I was about to find.

Growing up I experienced having shoes too small that my parents would split the leather on top so I could still get my feet into them. Clearly I remember wearing worn out shoes with holes in the bottom. But I always I had shoes and realized how lucky I was when I saw the image of the sandals made with flattened plastic bottles and tied on with torn cloth. The photograph pulled me into a dead stare as I fully took in what I was seeing. My eyes watered up.

Down further on the Google image search page was this little under nourished boy crouched down eating bread crumbs off a concrete floor. While my childhood was difficult, I had it really good compared to him.

Then came the little girl with the dirty dress that looked as if it had never been washed. She looks far older than her years and her solemn expression says to me she has likely seen horror far beyond what I can imagine.

The poem just below titled “Poverty” was written by Jane Taylor in the early 1800’s. Now 200 years later not much has changed.

I saw an old cottage of clay,
And only of mud was the floor;
It was all falling into decay,
And the snow drifted in at the door.

Yet there a poor family dwelt,
In a hovel so dismal and rude;
And though gnawing hunger they felt,
They had not a morsel of food.

The children were crying for bread,
And to their poor mother they’d run;
‘Oh, give us some breakfast,’ they said,
Alas! their poor mother had none.

She viewed them with looks of despair,
She said (and I’m sure it was true),
‘’Tis not for myself that I care,
But, my poor little children, for you.’

O then, let the wealthy and gay
But see such a hovel as this,
That in a poor cottage of clay
They may know what true misery is.

And what I may have to bestow
I never will squander away,
While many poor people I know
Around me are wretched as they.

Although I can’t directly affect the lives of the people pictured, I can have empathy for them. By acknowledging their life condition and showing it I take a little step to see they are not completely unknown and forgotten. In spite of their hardships they are not broken and somehow, someway they go doing the best they can. I can’t imagine living a life so grueling and filled with fear. The reminder of how hard life is for so many helped me start my day with a heightened sense of gratitude for how easy and full my life is. Today I won’t complain about a single thing!

Poverty is the worst form of violence.
Mahatma Gandhi