One Cold Monday

It has been cold here for a couple of weeks now. I believe the temperature made it out of the thirties today for the first time in over a week. Night time lows have been in the teens for at least a week. A lot of low temperature records have been recorded, and we still have a lot of winter yet to go.

I've lived most of my life in central Alabama. It is a great place to live. Natural beauty and a rich diversity of landscapes, from the mountains in the north down through the coastal plain flat woods; from the black belt prairie to the sandy beaches of the Gulf. Nice folks, too, on the whole. It's a place I'm proud to be from.

But many Alabamians are not equipped for weather like this.

The cold temperatures have been the main topic of conversation everywhere I go. Mostly people complaining about it. I confess I have complained some too. I don't have the tolerance for temperatures in the twenties and thirties that I once had. But I live in a nice house with central heat and a fireplace (that I hardly ever use). I have plenty of warm clothes. And quite frankly, most of the people I hear complaining have these things too.

But in reality, most of Alabama is still largely rural. You don't have to drive far from any of our towns, even the small ones, to see poverty. Sub-standard housing occupied by people who are are probably Black or elderly (or more likely both) who have got to be cold in these temperatures. Not just "suffering" from a shiver as they walk from their nice warm house to their nice warm car--but really suffering in houses and trailers where you can feel the north wind as it blows through the walls. These are the people trying to stay warm with fireplaces, wood stoves, or little gas space heaters. People wearing their winter clothes inside their homes.

I've been fortunate enough to travel to Honduras quite a few times in the last ten years. Poverty there is widespread, almost everywhere you look. It is stunning to a North American--it grabs your attention like a slap in the face.

The poverty in my own back yard is more subtle because it is not concentrated--it is scattered across the landscape. But it is just as real and just as profound. And it is largely being ignored: by the government, by the Church, by families, and by people like me.

I wonder how I'll sleep tonight. It's supposed to go down to seventeen.