I didn't know we were poor until it was pointed out to me, with sneer and disdainfully curled lip, topped with perfect blond curls and giant grosgrain bow, that I always wore the same dress to church.
I didn't know we didn't have what others thought we needed because I had
the wild woods, the endless Texas sky, a creek to dig toes in mud, and a
library so full of everything I could ever want to read, (I wanted to
make it so no one else could check out books and I would go A to Z and
read them all. If others checked out books, how would I know what I
missed?), 6 playmates, logs and leaves and forts and trees, a lake and a
flat bottom skiff and shiny brass hooks to catch those 'sucker fish'
with, with the night crawlers dug from the leaf beds, where the long,
tar-top driveway curved and ran to grandma's house.
I learned while my sister worked her first job to buy nicer things
than my parents could afford so she would feel like she fit in. And she
permed her hair and her eye lids turned a shimmery blue to be like
those other 90's teenagers. I learned when the kids around me asked if I
had worn those jeans yesterday. I had.
I learned when I saw
your house and realized that mine was different. That there was a hole
in the floor, where the only thing between me and the chickens
underneath the trailer was a green shag carpet. It bowed there and we
jumped over that spot between the living room and the kitchen. And the
thought of you coming over and knowing that about me, made my insides roil like a nest of rattlesnakes.
My three haven't learned. And we haven't lacked. Until now. When the job goes and the money dwindles and the roil comes back.
.
I am gloriously grateful today that a trip to buy new Storm Trooper shoes for a gift is all the birthday he needs. He hasn't discovered it yet. The Lack.
And this I know to be true, even if I don't manage to live there, The Lack, no matter how much we have or buy or give or fill up with 'things' and people, it will never go away. There will always be someone with more and will I compare or will I be content? Will I envy Disney and nicer, bigger houses and vacations and fancy mini-vans? Have I given the illusion that I have transcended the envy of 'stuff' but still envy bodies, and beauty and youth, and relationships and compare my inside to your outsides (and Facebook feed)?
Or will I close my eyes and find quiet in the lack?
Can I find quiet in the din of this noise in my head and this twisting roil of rattlesnakes, that's true name is Fear of being known and rejected?
Can I get by with filling my eyes with envy instead of the peace brought by the lack thereof?
Or can I live here? In the Lack? And hand over my worries and fear and just be content?
Sweet Lord, I hope I can.
