***This post is also running on the TriangleMom2Mom site where I write each week***
As I was eating breakfast with my 12 year old son the other day, I saw a story online about the famous “Migrant Mother” photo taken by Dorothy Lange in 1936, that captured the pain and hopelessness people felt during the Great Depression.
There has been a lot of discussion in my family about gas prices, the stock market, lack of jobs and the far-reaching effects of the current state of our economy.
I showed my son the picture and told him that the subject of the picture, Florence Owens Thompson, had seven children and that she and her family had to live in tents or cars as they traveled from farm to farm in California picking cotton. I wanted him to understand how devastating that time was and, I guess, how fortunate we are today. I said, “Her kids didn’t even get to go to school. They worked in the fields with their Mom every day just to survive.”
His response, “Well, I guess that’s what she gets for putting all of her money in the stock market.” A fuller explanation of the Depression followed, an explanation that I hope he gets when he is taking American History in high school. I feel that as we get further and further away from historical events, they become defined by one particular thing and the details are lost. For many, the stock market crash equals the Depression just like “Let them eat cake” defines the French Revolution.
As we experience our current economic situation and I see the effects on us and people close to us, I hope that history doesn’t repeat itself, plunging us into the bleak times of the Depression. And most of all, I hope that we can tear ourselves away from the news channels, their constant stock market analysis, their sterile statistics on unemployment rates and their talk of multi-billion dollar bail-outs and remember that, like the Migrant Mother in the 1930s, there are individuals, families and children whose very survival is impacted by the economy today.
I hope we don’t see the percentage of unemployed without remembering that the people who comprise that percentage are struggling to put food on their tables and making decisions between purchasing their prescriptions and paying the electric bill. I hope that the economic good fortune that many of us have experienced for most of our lives, doesn’t make us view those who are in need as slackers who collect welfare and would be fine if they just got off the couch and got a job. I have heard this sentiment on several occasions from many different people. Call me a Liberal, a label I wear proudly, but this opinion is appalling to me!
The Migrant Mother in the picture was 32 years old when the picture was taken. Look at the picture again. Think about it.
Di
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