Tiny Plastic Houses

The Grapes of Wrath Have Not Yet Withered on the Vine …

So, I pulled out my trusty old copy of Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath and began reading (or re-reading, I guess … does it count if you were 8 when you read it the last time?) …

As always, it was a heart breaking experience. On one hand you have the horrific circumstances that push the people off their land and force them into degradation and starvation. In the other you have the machine that drives the gears of progress (government, elitism, bigotry, fear, etc.)…

During one of my reads, however, I noticed something new: A quote from a review on the back cover that unsettled me. The quote, published in Time Magazine, stated that "The way of life [the book] describes is no more."

I read this statement and wondered how could such a bold statement be made? In today's age are people not forced from their homes when the banks or the landlords are not getting their money? Homes that they have put their heart and soul into … Homes where their children were raised, where their loved ones grew old and, perhaps, died? Are people not forced to draw upon credit to pay for food and necessities until they are so deeply in debt that they have no chance of getting out? Are there not vagrant camps full of people sleeping under rotting blankets, covered by cardboard boxes or in their cars? Or migrants who will work for less because they're hungry and needy and their deepest understandings are ignorance and want, not social change and politics? Are you going to claim there is no starvation, no horrific suffering, no poverty?

I laugh in the face of those that make such bold claims. Just because you have not seen it or are not aware does not make it nonexistent! I, personally, have seen the  vagrant camps, the hobo's lying under bridges, the people huddled over street vents … is that really that different from a Hooverville where everyone, eventually, dies or is shoved on? I have felt the sting of massive debt … debt so deep it feels like you will never be able to climb out of the hole you've dug. I've been made to work for less than I was worth at a job I hated simply because we needed the money. Lot's of people bear these burdens everyday.

I can point to 4 houses on my block where I know that those children most likely will not have a good supper tonight. I can gaze at several people I work with and realize that they will never own their own home, nor can they make this month's rent. I can look into the branches of my own family and see people who have worked hard and struggled their entire lives to come out in the end old and withered, waiting to die … with little to hold onto … not even hope.

So, to say that America has moved beyond the world portrayed in this book is bullshit. We may have aged and we may have changed, but a lot of these same problems still plague the country … they just have new names and new faces …  and new widely accepted racial and economic prejudices to hold up in front of our children's eyes.

~H

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 5th, 2009 at 1:23 pm. It is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.