I smiled at the anecdote of looking at the library card to see who else has borrowed a book and, additionally, when it was last borrowed. I do the same thing. As a reader and a teacher I have begun in the past few years to give books from my 'personal library' to others without expecting the books to return. Often the books are returned, but even saying a 'personal' library is starting to feel off.
I am tempted, at times, to only borrow from the library and sidestep asking a friend or colleague if I can borrow something I know they have in their 'personal library'. That is, I am tempted to sidestep interaction and replace it with transaction. Just this morning I have had no luck finding a book in the university's catalogue. While the library's resources enable me to search the state for a copy of the book at any public or university library, and we are encouraged to do so by library staff, I suspect that my colleague down the hall has a copy in their office or at their home. I will go ask them, but why is this not my first impulse?
Here is where I sense we can begin subverting the book-hunting-consumer instinct: When purchasing a book I see now there is always the possibility that it will be given it away, and probably should be given away. In the end, I may not be buying it for myself at all.
I am reminded of how struck I was the first time I read The Elves and the Shoemaker (by the Brothers Grimm, available in a beautifully illustrated version by Jim LaMarche) by the fact that when buyers come into the shop and find the elfen-made shoes that are perfectly suited to them, they are so delighted that they offer to pay double the shoes' price. It was that attitude, not the existence of magical creatures, that most felt like an imaginary fairy tale to me. But what a beautiful lived expression of honesty and generosity to say, "These are worth more to me than you are asking, and I would like to pay their actual value." Not always possible or even advisable, but sometimes it could be! Instead of thinking our job as buyers is to maximize the "deal" we can get, could we begin considering whether the prices we pay are an honest reflection of the value we are receiving and the time and craftsmanship put into them by the seller? And if things seem out of whack, to consider correcting the imbalance by simply offering to pay more when we can?
This has come up when my husband commissions art for his rpgs (https://cloven-pine-games.itch.io/), and sometimes is quoted too low a price by artists. He has sometimes bid up the quote to reflect the value and the work.
This reminds me of a story that made the rounds on Facebook as a meme a few years back about a woman taking pride in bartering down a poor street vendor for the eggs they were selling and then later being very generous to somebody who was in far less need but where it made her look good. It then asked the question "Why do we always show we have the power when we buy from the needy ones? And why do we get generous to those who do not even need our generosity?"
And then the author noted they once read somewhere this:
"'My father used to buy simple goods from poor people at high prices, even though he did not need them. Sometimes he even used to pay extra for them. I got concerned by this act and asked him why does he do so? Then my father replied, "It is a charity wrapped with dignity, my child”
I really loved that last bit! What a good father who modeled our heavenly Father so well!!
Charity wrapped in dignity. Compassion without humiliation. Whenever we can do this... we should!!!
Yes I give to people forced to beg, but oh so much better to pay people an honest wage or (even a generous one if we can) for a genuine good or service when we can. Better for them, better for me. Compassion to my brother who is my equal before the Lord. No loss of dignity for them, no unmerited temptation to a sinful type of pride for me.
One of my favorite Hymns from my youth is "They will know we are Christians by our Love" and in one of the verses it says, "We will Guard Each Man's Dignity and Save him from his Pride". Somehow much of the Church has seemed to lose that message... and we need desperately to find it again... for both others AND ourselves.
I'm currently in that liminal space in my mid-twenties where I'm not especially dependent on anyone, and no one is especially dependent on me. I remember when Leah ran an interview with Snead a few months back, a question she kept bringing the conversation back to was: how can we change our lives so that we are more confronted with the needs of others in the day-to-day? I love my Buy Nothing group and I'm quite active in it, but I do typically see it as promoting sustainability and reuse rather than calling us to sacrifice to meet the needs of others. I do some amount of volunteering, but it doesn't feel *integrated* into my life in the same way that taking care of a sick friend or giving money to the homeless man who sits outside my grocery store does. I think it's hard to build a life that treasures stewardship without that sense of integration or confrontation with the needs of others, and I wonder if anyone else has thoughts on what I could do differently to encounter that confrontation.
It seems like every holding or use of land is a gift. We didn’t create the Earth - God did. At the very beginning of being able to provide for our basic needs, there’s the gift of creation (existence) itself. A lot of our needs are provided for in the market economy - my husband and I work, and we use our paychecks to pay the mortgage and the utility bills and buy food. But they all rest on that first gift of creation.
I know that *someone* is going to recommend Braiding Sweetgrass (https://amzn.to/3rn6zj5) so I'm jumping in first! And I also love Victoria Sweet (a doctor and author of God's Hotel https://amzn.to/3nfbyRp) on the givenness/giftedness of the body, particularly as a doctor who cares for patients.
At the library where I work, sometimes if someone has printed out a single page (costs twenty-five cents) and pays with a dollar bill, they'll tell me to keep the change to cover whoever prints stuff off next. I'm not usually on that end of the transaction but I like the principle.
I also work at a library, and people do that all the time here as well! I've had a few people attempt to tip me, also, even though we definitely don't ask for tips; we just mark the tip attempts as donations.
This is my favorite Other Feminisms post so far and I can't wait to read your whole piece in Comment!
One practice that I adopted with my kiddo over the past couple years is a practice of donating toys, regularly. It's now common practice if my kiddo expresses a desire for a new-to-him toy we will fill up a bag of toys and donate them before we get it.
I also have joined a few mutual aid groups and my local Buy Nothing Project group, and my son comes along when we bring something to a neighbors porch, or pick something up from theirs.
These weekly+ gift-exchanges have very much helped the way both me and my son relate to consumption, although part of me is also less enthused about the thing-centric-ness of these activities. I'd like the exchange of objects to be a less prominent way to express 'I see you and I love you' to our fellow people.
I really like this as a practice! How young did you introduce this?
Right now, we simply donate excess toys ourselves in self-defence.
One other thing we've thought about as a practice of giving for Beatrice (and soon, Thalia) is that we have tiny stockings for the babies we lost before birth. We're leaning towards putting small sums of money in them at Christmas and then putting Beatrice and Thalia in charge of choosing a charity to give that money to on their siblings' behalf.
We started the practice when he was three, and honestly, this is one where we lucked out with pandemic-YouTube. Deep in the depths of quarantine we started watching toy unboxing videos and I struggled to find ones that I found not-horrible. Luckily we stumbled on a channel (TurboToyTime) with a dad and son who donated all the toys they opened, and talked regularly about donating toys before getting new ones. My kiddo wanted to emulate them. Thankfully toy videos are a thing of the past, but donating isn't!
We also donate toys regularly, although for us "regularly" means big toy donation purges about twice a year (one is always during Advent). It is both a means of showing our kids that if we aren't using something anymore, it's good to pass it on to someone who can, and of making room in our small house for the new things that continue to arrive. I have to admit to myself that I would almost certainly be less disciplined about this practice of generosity if we had a lot more square footage available, and in fact might feel like I should be filling the space with more and more things. Bigger houses leads to more stuff, and more ability to hang on to things just in case we might need them in the future (as opposed to my family now, who must ruthlessly purge our belongings from time to time just to keep our little space orderly).
Yes, I’ve experienced that as well! I wouldn’t call our house small, but space - especially on the main floor - is somewhat at a premium. It’s helped us be deliberate about what is worth bringing into the house and what is worth saving. Most houses in the area are of similar size and space constraints, which I think has helped foster a communal rotation of baby gear and children’s toys. I’m not too nervous about giving away our baby swing, because I know that if we have another baby, chances are there will be plenty of swings people are ready to pass on.
I was thinking about your questions in light of a book I read recently, Work Won't Love You Back, in which the author, Sarah Jaffe, talks about the ways in which modern work encourages people not to think about their jobs in a market context, but to draw upon the notion of "love" meaning we are supposed to give (gift) our all to the job over everything else.
As for other contexts, I am reminded of women (and I'm sure some men too) who give their all to their partner's business, as a gift of love, but without compensation, as though there were no market aspects at stake, only to be shafted upon a breakup. I'm sure this happens in family businesses as well when there are married spouses. Considering it further, any kind of family business can raise this dynamic, I think.
How to keep in touch with others' needs and how to be aware I might be called upon to give up something? Those two questions are closely intertwined as I think about the struggling relatives who need help. I'm in touch with them, so I'm always aware of their need.
Further thoughts. I'm always aware of the need to give away things. I regularly donate to charities, including donating things I don't need anymore, especially books and clothes.
I recently bought a package of peas no one in the house wanted to eat. I then went out and bought twenty dollars worth of food to donate to a food pantry, along with the peas.
I once saw a twenty dollar bill on the floor of a supermarket. I couldn't be sure whose it was, so I picked it up and bought food for a food pantry.
I hate to be dense but I’m not sure I’m understanding the problem or the issue. One of the questions was about parting with possessions. You mean like departing with our gainfully earned income through heavy regulatory taxation?☺️
It seems that very few people today in the United States are in need of much of anything that’s material, particularly in the area of the country I’m in. If you have even a job with an hourly wage you can go to Walmart and buy kids’ clothes for next to nothing. Affluence has, at least partially, raised all boats. Thus, I rarely look at the coat in my closet and speculate as to who needs it. Pretty much nobody.
The last “donation” I made was to buy clothes and a Christmas gift for a girl in foster care, a child who is essentially “homeless “. This girl needs a lot more than the LOL doll I got her.( In fact, I kind of squirmed at giving her such an item). How much did I help her?
One area where I can understand gifting is in the scholarship fund at our local catholic school. The tuition is $5,000/year. Families who can buy food and clothes at Walmart cannot necessarily afford that tuition especially if they have four or five kids.
The need there is for access to something other than public school. It is an increasingly desperate need as we witness the erosion of traditional values and the creep of woke-ism, CRT and sexual agendas.
So, back to that coat in my closet or my grandkids discarded toys, those are the small potatoes. Working toward building up better schools, strengthening the family, living out one’s values, caring for kids whose parents work would seem to be tangible acts of donation that are worth more than donating a coat. The Samaritan, recall, actually got down off his horse. I try to keep him in mind and too often find I don’t measure up.
Hm, I’m not sure that I’d agree that very few people in the US are in need of anything material. For example, pre-expanded child tax credit (now expired!) an estimated 1 in 5 children was food insecure. Medical debt is a common contributor to bankruptcy. These both are areas of material need.
I learned an interesting fact recently that many countries have banned (or would like to ban) the import of US secondhand clothing. They’re drowning in our fast fashion cast offs, and it’s disrupting their own local economies. It’s interesting to me that I regularly encounter people in my own neighborhood in need of winter weather gear, socks, and underwear while other countries are suffering from a deluge of American cast offs, some with the tags still on.
And that's a good example where the aid needed is a mix of money and presence. Being a navigator for a vulnerable mom to get the aid she's entitled to is a big service (and one some pregnancy resource centers find is as useful as donated supplies).
Somewhat of a tangent, but we were recently denied participation in a patient assistance program for our daughter’s (very expensive) medication. The company’s reasoning was that an algorithm product they had purchased from Experian told them our household income was too high to qualify, and they wouldn’t look at our paystubs or W-2s which clearly showed that we were under the income cut off. Eventually they reran it under my name, and amazingly a woman’s name at the same address made our household income “drop.” But here’s an example of a private program designed to meet a material need which does not function in practice (and has almost no recourse).
"Medical debt is a common contributor to bankruptcy"...
...and all sorts of medical goings-on can contribute to a "delinquent" level of behindhandedness and disorganization that means stuff your family needs isn't necessarily there when they need it, even if your family income is at least middle-class.
If your body isn't reliable, *you* are unreliable. Even if there's no reasonable path toward making your body reliable, so that you can't be blamed for its unreliability, unreliable body means unreliable *you*. It makes getting stuff when you need it, even if on paper you can afford it, harder. It also makes giving stuff away harder.
If you're parenting in an unreliable body, you might find that you're "that parent", at least sometimes — the parent who didn't pick up the thing in time for your kid because you were having an attack of whatever makes your body unreliable. All those unreliabilities we associate with drug-using parents? They can happen to parents whose bodies simply poop out on them, especially if those parents don't have a robust support network. Maybe not as often as with drug users: a sober mind in an unreliable body still has more foresight and ability to improvise sensibly than an intoxicated mind would. But still often enough to be "that parent".
I entered childbearing with with a misdiagnosed condition known for making other, recognized conditions of mine harder to control. I experienced, during childbearing, that whether the mother can function in her pregnant body is (understandably, probably even justly, but still frustratingly!) a much lower priority than whether the unborn child is safe. Then COVID came and I was one of those with the vulnerable lungs who has to think at least twice before seeking help outside my immediate household. Now that I'm vaxxed and boosted, and ready to treat Omicron as personally no more risky to me than a common cold, the fact is my lungs are still beat up enough from my last pregnancy to make my catching a common cold, well, nothing to sneeze at.
So sometimes I'm that mom, and I now have more patience for other moms who are that mom. Our eldest attends the local public school, in a district with some poverty, but mostly middle-class, and a reputation for good social service. Still, the teachers find they can use extra school supplies, extra mittens — extras kids might not need if their parents weren't "those parents" or the kids themselves weren't "that kid" who can't seem to organize their stuff even if their parents aren't "those parents". Sending those small things along to school is one of the more feasible ways for me to help others without having more help myself.
Because what I said about "It also makes giving stuff away harder" is also true, at least for me. Successfully donating stuff to those who could use it is physically and logistically hard for me right now. I do sort and pack up stuff to donate, only to have a kid get into it before it's sent off — or memorably of a donation stored in the garage just itching for drop-off, squirrels. Our house has become the Hotel California of stuff during COVID-tide, and it's driving me faintly nuts. But order markers online in bulk when my kid only needs one pack for school and send the other packs directly on to school, no sorting, no storage? That I still can do. So I do it, knowing how little it is.
I smiled at the anecdote of looking at the library card to see who else has borrowed a book and, additionally, when it was last borrowed. I do the same thing. As a reader and a teacher I have begun in the past few years to give books from my 'personal library' to others without expecting the books to return. Often the books are returned, but even saying a 'personal' library is starting to feel off.
I am tempted, at times, to only borrow from the library and sidestep asking a friend or colleague if I can borrow something I know they have in their 'personal library'. That is, I am tempted to sidestep interaction and replace it with transaction. Just this morning I have had no luck finding a book in the university's catalogue. While the library's resources enable me to search the state for a copy of the book at any public or university library, and we are encouraged to do so by library staff, I suspect that my colleague down the hall has a copy in their office or at their home. I will go ask them, but why is this not my first impulse?
Here is where I sense we can begin subverting the book-hunting-consumer instinct: When purchasing a book I see now there is always the possibility that it will be given it away, and probably should be given away. In the end, I may not be buying it for myself at all.
I am reminded of how struck I was the first time I read The Elves and the Shoemaker (by the Brothers Grimm, available in a beautifully illustrated version by Jim LaMarche) by the fact that when buyers come into the shop and find the elfen-made shoes that are perfectly suited to them, they are so delighted that they offer to pay double the shoes' price. It was that attitude, not the existence of magical creatures, that most felt like an imaginary fairy tale to me. But what a beautiful lived expression of honesty and generosity to say, "These are worth more to me than you are asking, and I would like to pay their actual value." Not always possible or even advisable, but sometimes it could be! Instead of thinking our job as buyers is to maximize the "deal" we can get, could we begin considering whether the prices we pay are an honest reflection of the value we are receiving and the time and craftsmanship put into them by the seller? And if things seem out of whack, to consider correcting the imbalance by simply offering to pay more when we can?
This has come up when my husband commissions art for his rpgs (https://cloven-pine-games.itch.io/), and sometimes is quoted too low a price by artists. He has sometimes bid up the quote to reflect the value and the work.
This reminds me of a story that made the rounds on Facebook as a meme a few years back about a woman taking pride in bartering down a poor street vendor for the eggs they were selling and then later being very generous to somebody who was in far less need but where it made her look good. It then asked the question "Why do we always show we have the power when we buy from the needy ones? And why do we get generous to those who do not even need our generosity?"
And then the author noted they once read somewhere this:
"'My father used to buy simple goods from poor people at high prices, even though he did not need them. Sometimes he even used to pay extra for them. I got concerned by this act and asked him why does he do so? Then my father replied, "It is a charity wrapped with dignity, my child”
I really loved that last bit! What a good father who modeled our heavenly Father so well!!
Charity wrapped in dignity. Compassion without humiliation. Whenever we can do this... we should!!!
Yes I give to people forced to beg, but oh so much better to pay people an honest wage or (even a generous one if we can) for a genuine good or service when we can. Better for them, better for me. Compassion to my brother who is my equal before the Lord. No loss of dignity for them, no unmerited temptation to a sinful type of pride for me.
One of my favorite Hymns from my youth is "They will know we are Christians by our Love" and in one of the verses it says, "We will Guard Each Man's Dignity and Save him from his Pride". Somehow much of the Church has seemed to lose that message... and we need desperately to find it again... for both others AND ourselves.
I'm currently in that liminal space in my mid-twenties where I'm not especially dependent on anyone, and no one is especially dependent on me. I remember when Leah ran an interview with Snead a few months back, a question she kept bringing the conversation back to was: how can we change our lives so that we are more confronted with the needs of others in the day-to-day? I love my Buy Nothing group and I'm quite active in it, but I do typically see it as promoting sustainability and reuse rather than calling us to sacrifice to meet the needs of others. I do some amount of volunteering, but it doesn't feel *integrated* into my life in the same way that taking care of a sick friend or giving money to the homeless man who sits outside my grocery store does. I think it's hard to build a life that treasures stewardship without that sense of integration or confrontation with the needs of others, and I wonder if anyone else has thoughts on what I could do differently to encounter that confrontation.
It seems like every holding or use of land is a gift. We didn’t create the Earth - God did. At the very beginning of being able to provide for our basic needs, there’s the gift of creation (existence) itself. A lot of our needs are provided for in the market economy - my husband and I work, and we use our paychecks to pay the mortgage and the utility bills and buy food. But they all rest on that first gift of creation.
I know that *someone* is going to recommend Braiding Sweetgrass (https://amzn.to/3rn6zj5) so I'm jumping in first! And I also love Victoria Sweet (a doctor and author of God's Hotel https://amzn.to/3nfbyRp) on the givenness/giftedness of the body, particularly as a doctor who cares for patients.
>>>Where (in a market context) does the “logic of gift and the principle of gratuitousness” have a foothold?
How do you remind yourself that you might be called upon to relinquish something you currently possess?<<<
Having a good Last Will and Testament as well as Advance Directives are helpful in this respect.
There will be a time when I will no longer possess my body, so at least I can share my wishes.
Also, I’ve been a victim of people stealing my stuff off and on and... you get less attached.
At the library where I work, sometimes if someone has printed out a single page (costs twenty-five cents) and pays with a dollar bill, they'll tell me to keep the change to cover whoever prints stuff off next. I'm not usually on that end of the transaction but I like the principle.
I also work at a library, and people do that all the time here as well! I've had a few people attempt to tip me, also, even though we definitely don't ask for tips; we just mark the tip attempts as donations.
This is my favorite Other Feminisms post so far and I can't wait to read your whole piece in Comment!
One practice that I adopted with my kiddo over the past couple years is a practice of donating toys, regularly. It's now common practice if my kiddo expresses a desire for a new-to-him toy we will fill up a bag of toys and donate them before we get it.
I also have joined a few mutual aid groups and my local Buy Nothing Project group, and my son comes along when we bring something to a neighbors porch, or pick something up from theirs.
These weekly+ gift-exchanges have very much helped the way both me and my son relate to consumption, although part of me is also less enthused about the thing-centric-ness of these activities. I'd like the exchange of objects to be a less prominent way to express 'I see you and I love you' to our fellow people.
I really like this as a practice! How young did you introduce this?
Right now, we simply donate excess toys ourselves in self-defence.
One other thing we've thought about as a practice of giving for Beatrice (and soon, Thalia) is that we have tiny stockings for the babies we lost before birth. We're leaning towards putting small sums of money in them at Christmas and then putting Beatrice and Thalia in charge of choosing a charity to give that money to on their siblings' behalf.
We started the practice when he was three, and honestly, this is one where we lucked out with pandemic-YouTube. Deep in the depths of quarantine we started watching toy unboxing videos and I struggled to find ones that I found not-horrible. Luckily we stumbled on a channel (TurboToyTime) with a dad and son who donated all the toys they opened, and talked regularly about donating toys before getting new ones. My kiddo wanted to emulate them. Thankfully toy videos are a thing of the past, but donating isn't!
We also donate toys regularly, although for us "regularly" means big toy donation purges about twice a year (one is always during Advent). It is both a means of showing our kids that if we aren't using something anymore, it's good to pass it on to someone who can, and of making room in our small house for the new things that continue to arrive. I have to admit to myself that I would almost certainly be less disciplined about this practice of generosity if we had a lot more square footage available, and in fact might feel like I should be filling the space with more and more things. Bigger houses leads to more stuff, and more ability to hang on to things just in case we might need them in the future (as opposed to my family now, who must ruthlessly purge our belongings from time to time just to keep our little space orderly).
Yes, I’ve experienced that as well! I wouldn’t call our house small, but space - especially on the main floor - is somewhat at a premium. It’s helped us be deliberate about what is worth bringing into the house and what is worth saving. Most houses in the area are of similar size and space constraints, which I think has helped foster a communal rotation of baby gear and children’s toys. I’m not too nervous about giving away our baby swing, because I know that if we have another baby, chances are there will be plenty of swings people are ready to pass on.
I was thinking about your questions in light of a book I read recently, Work Won't Love You Back, in which the author, Sarah Jaffe, talks about the ways in which modern work encourages people not to think about their jobs in a market context, but to draw upon the notion of "love" meaning we are supposed to give (gift) our all to the job over everything else.
As for other contexts, I am reminded of women (and I'm sure some men too) who give their all to their partner's business, as a gift of love, but without compensation, as though there were no market aspects at stake, only to be shafted upon a breakup. I'm sure this happens in family businesses as well when there are married spouses. Considering it further, any kind of family business can raise this dynamic, I think.
How to keep in touch with others' needs and how to be aware I might be called upon to give up something? Those two questions are closely intertwined as I think about the struggling relatives who need help. I'm in touch with them, so I'm always aware of their need.
Further thoughts. I'm always aware of the need to give away things. I regularly donate to charities, including donating things I don't need anymore, especially books and clothes.
I recently bought a package of peas no one in the house wanted to eat. I then went out and bought twenty dollars worth of food to donate to a food pantry, along with the peas.
I once saw a twenty dollar bill on the floor of a supermarket. I couldn't be sure whose it was, so I picked it up and bought food for a food pantry.
It's about a constant awareness, I think.
Hoarding, of course, is a failed attempt to evade mortality.
I hate to be dense but I’m not sure I’m understanding the problem or the issue. One of the questions was about parting with possessions. You mean like departing with our gainfully earned income through heavy regulatory taxation?☺️
It seems that very few people today in the United States are in need of much of anything that’s material, particularly in the area of the country I’m in. If you have even a job with an hourly wage you can go to Walmart and buy kids’ clothes for next to nothing. Affluence has, at least partially, raised all boats. Thus, I rarely look at the coat in my closet and speculate as to who needs it. Pretty much nobody.
The last “donation” I made was to buy clothes and a Christmas gift for a girl in foster care, a child who is essentially “homeless “. This girl needs a lot more than the LOL doll I got her.( In fact, I kind of squirmed at giving her such an item). How much did I help her?
One area where I can understand gifting is in the scholarship fund at our local catholic school. The tuition is $5,000/year. Families who can buy food and clothes at Walmart cannot necessarily afford that tuition especially if they have four or five kids.
The need there is for access to something other than public school. It is an increasingly desperate need as we witness the erosion of traditional values and the creep of woke-ism, CRT and sexual agendas.
So, back to that coat in my closet or my grandkids discarded toys, those are the small potatoes. Working toward building up better schools, strengthening the family, living out one’s values, caring for kids whose parents work would seem to be tangible acts of donation that are worth more than donating a coat. The Samaritan, recall, actually got down off his horse. I try to keep him in mind and too often find I don’t measure up.
Hm, I’m not sure that I’d agree that very few people in the US are in need of anything material. For example, pre-expanded child tax credit (now expired!) an estimated 1 in 5 children was food insecure. Medical debt is a common contributor to bankruptcy. These both are areas of material need.
I learned an interesting fact recently that many countries have banned (or would like to ban) the import of US secondhand clothing. They’re drowning in our fast fashion cast offs, and it’s disrupting their own local economies. It’s interesting to me that I regularly encounter people in my own neighborhood in need of winter weather gear, socks, and underwear while other countries are suffering from a deluge of American cast offs, some with the tags still on.
Diaper banks are also a good example of basic needs that aren't being met: https://nationaldiaperbanknetwork.org/
In some cases, there's a safety net *on paper* that meets needs, but it's too hard to navigate in practice for the vulnerable to get the benefit. TANF is notorious in this respect: https://www.propublica.org/article/a-mother-needed-welfare-instead-the-state-used-welfare-funds-to-take-her-son
And that's a good example where the aid needed is a mix of money and presence. Being a navigator for a vulnerable mom to get the aid she's entitled to is a big service (and one some pregnancy resource centers find is as useful as donated supplies).
Somewhat of a tangent, but we were recently denied participation in a patient assistance program for our daughter’s (very expensive) medication. The company’s reasoning was that an algorithm product they had purchased from Experian told them our household income was too high to qualify, and they wouldn’t look at our paystubs or W-2s which clearly showed that we were under the income cut off. Eventually they reran it under my name, and amazingly a woman’s name at the same address made our household income “drop.” But here’s an example of a private program designed to meet a material need which does not function in practice (and has almost no recourse).
"Medical debt is a common contributor to bankruptcy"...
...and all sorts of medical goings-on can contribute to a "delinquent" level of behindhandedness and disorganization that means stuff your family needs isn't necessarily there when they need it, even if your family income is at least middle-class.
If your body isn't reliable, *you* are unreliable. Even if there's no reasonable path toward making your body reliable, so that you can't be blamed for its unreliability, unreliable body means unreliable *you*. It makes getting stuff when you need it, even if on paper you can afford it, harder. It also makes giving stuff away harder.
If you're parenting in an unreliable body, you might find that you're "that parent", at least sometimes — the parent who didn't pick up the thing in time for your kid because you were having an attack of whatever makes your body unreliable. All those unreliabilities we associate with drug-using parents? They can happen to parents whose bodies simply poop out on them, especially if those parents don't have a robust support network. Maybe not as often as with drug users: a sober mind in an unreliable body still has more foresight and ability to improvise sensibly than an intoxicated mind would. But still often enough to be "that parent".
I entered childbearing with with a misdiagnosed condition known for making other, recognized conditions of mine harder to control. I experienced, during childbearing, that whether the mother can function in her pregnant body is (understandably, probably even justly, but still frustratingly!) a much lower priority than whether the unborn child is safe. Then COVID came and I was one of those with the vulnerable lungs who has to think at least twice before seeking help outside my immediate household. Now that I'm vaxxed and boosted, and ready to treat Omicron as personally no more risky to me than a common cold, the fact is my lungs are still beat up enough from my last pregnancy to make my catching a common cold, well, nothing to sneeze at.
So sometimes I'm that mom, and I now have more patience for other moms who are that mom. Our eldest attends the local public school, in a district with some poverty, but mostly middle-class, and a reputation for good social service. Still, the teachers find they can use extra school supplies, extra mittens — extras kids might not need if their parents weren't "those parents" or the kids themselves weren't "that kid" who can't seem to organize their stuff even if their parents aren't "those parents". Sending those small things along to school is one of the more feasible ways for me to help others without having more help myself.
Because what I said about "It also makes giving stuff away harder" is also true, at least for me. Successfully donating stuff to those who could use it is physically and logistically hard for me right now. I do sort and pack up stuff to donate, only to have a kid get into it before it's sent off — or memorably of a donation stored in the garage just itching for drop-off, squirrels. Our house has become the Hotel California of stuff during COVID-tide, and it's driving me faintly nuts. But order markers online in bulk when my kid only needs one pack for school and send the other packs directly on to school, no sorting, no storage? That I still can do. So I do it, knowing how little it is.