Afterthoughts

A full weekend has just passed after the $2 a day project. Friday I was hosting a prospective student from NYU. She spent the night Thursday, and I told her about the project because I figured it was only fair that she knew I didn't normally smell or look like this. I think she understood, hopefully. But I remember feeling ashamed. I was ashamed on Thursday when I went to meet her because I hadn't showered, I didn't have any make-up on, and I felt gross. I was ashamed Friday morning when we got dressed as I took note of all her fancy New York clothes and accessories, taking 30 minutes to get ready whereas I rolled out of bed, brushed my teeth and threw on my shoes. I felt ashamed of seeming poor. I kept fighting back the urge to constantly state every 2 seconds "I don't normally look like this, you know," ..."you know, I don't normally..." Why? When she left I felt ashamed for feeling shame. I did. I rebuked myself for attempting to apologize for simplicity.
On Friday night I went home and took about an hour long bath, ate wonderful home-cooked food, and then came back to school and poured myself one, or two or erh, several glasses of wine. The rest of the weekend flew by as usual, with one exception. Whether I dressed myself to go out or dressed down to stay in, there would be moments throughout the weekend where I'd stop and think "this one purchase just squandered two months livelihood of 2.8 billion people," or thoughts similar to that.

We were extremely lucky with our timing for this whole endeavor. Saturday morning many of us woke to the unnatural surprise of an inch of snow on the ground. It snowed saturday, in April!? Also on saturday I had my period. Timing was on our side in this project, absolutely. As I walked around town saturday I kept thinking about those who had to wake up on saturday to cold, hunger, poverty, and snow. I also thought about how many of the 2.8 people are women, about how many of them live on the burden of $2 a day accompanied by the burden I'm feeling right now. Wherever I went and whatever I did this weekend there persisted subconscious feeling of gratitude and perspective.

I went back to the Dollar General saturday to buy an easter basket for my Little in Big Brothers Big Sisters, and I smiled. I smiled because the Dollar General is inexorably linked to my hardships this past week. When I went into Wal-mart today I also smiled, for the very same reason. Normally I just roll my eyes and annoyingly brush past the crowd of mumbling immigrants, but not any more. I hadn't had anything but an apple and a coffee all day (out of stupidity, not poverty) and so when I passed these HUGE bags of animal crackers I gasped silently to myself and thought "I want those." So I grabbe the kiddy pack and heady to the register. But as I stood in line I realized that I never checked their price. Normally I would have just gaffed it off and buy it, but when it was my turn the first thing I did was ask the cashier how much the box of animal crackers was. "96 cents," she said. Deal. As I walked back to my car with several animal crackers in my mouth, I thought "wow, these are almost half of what 2.8 billion people live on in one day.....I closed the crackers, threw them into my car and drove back to school.