I am glad Spring is here

When it came to things poetic, I am obtuse. A couple of days ago, however, I came across this poem by Robert Frost. The next day I stopped by the South Plains Food Bank Farm and our Apple Orchard. The GRUB Kids have been getting the farm ready for our growing season. Debbie Cline, our Farm Manager, has already harvested some asparagus. Onions are planted. Lettuce and cabbage are growing. Tulips are about to bloom.

At the Apple Orchard, 2,500 trees have been pruned. The trees are leafing out. The Jonagold Apple Trees are beginning to bloom.The Orchard is taking off!

The produce that comes from the farm and the orchard will wind up providing tasty treats for the clients of the South Plains Food Bank... at least that's the hope. I don't know what kinds of flood, droughts, hail storms, freezes, or pest we will have in the weeks and months to come but for the moment, we are full of hope. The hope of new beginnings.

I am glad Spring is here.


A Prayer in Spring
Robert Frost

OH, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.
And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.
For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.

Neighbors

Do you ever struggle with the question, "who is my neighbor?" Every day at the South Plains Food Bank I see people stopping by to pick up a food box. I see people at our Kids Cafe sites or Community Kitchens. And every day when I see these people,  I get a reminder that my neighbor is whoever is in need.

Paul is one of the neighbors I have come to know over the years. When he is able, Paul volunteers at the food bank. He is a Viet Nam War vet and one of the sweetest and kindest men I have ever known. But life has been a been a hard struggle. Illness has kept him from holding down a full time job. I had not seen Paul for nearly a year when he and his wife stopped by the food bank a couple of days before Christmas.

Paul has always been cheerful and fun to talk with. He always promises to return to volunteer when he can. Sometimes he comes back, sometimes he doesn't.

But this time when I saw Paul,  the sparkle had gone out of his eyes. He has been losing weight. His clothes now hang on him. He didn't want to talk about himself though. He wanted to know about my family and how things were going around the food bank.

As we loaded up a food box for Paul and his wife, he looked at me and told me to tell everybody thank you. "You know David, we couldn't make it without this food. You know what I mean?" I know exactly what he means. Life can be brutal for people who are hungry and hurting. Sometimes the best we can do is to be a neighbor to our neighbors in need...  to feed them, to love them,  to hold out hope for a better year to come.

Thinking about my friend Paul, I am so grateful for neighbors who care. I am passing on Paul's message.

Thank you to all our volunteers who took time to help!

Some refried beans...

Each year, youngsters from area schools donate canned and non-perishable foods to the South Plains Food Bank through the U-Can Share Food Drive. It is an exciting and fun time of the year to see the kids get involved with different ways to collect food.

Out of the hundreds of thousands of cans we received this December, one caught the eye of a volunteer at the U-Can Share site. It was a can of refried beans with a message:"I hope this makes you better."

That sums up the work of the South Plains Food Bank, especially this time of the year. As we take this can and combine it with others to make our food boxes, there is the message for the people we serve. It is this, "we hope the box of food you receive from us -- whether a child, a senior citizen, or a out of work family -- makes you better. Better by feeding your body but also better by feeding your spirit. People on the South Plains care about you."

I never new canned refried beans could taste so good.

Missing meals...

I, too, - like SPFB CEO David Weaver - am taking the Texas "SNAP" (formerly known as food stamps) Challenge. It has been a challenge that has brought back LOTS of feelings and emotions...

Just this past July, I ended 18 months of myself and my son relying on SNAP benefits. I am not that far off from the panic and anxiety that I lived with day in and day out - worrying that my son was going to have enough to eat. That kind of fear and worry does something to you... no one should have to live on that kind of emotional roller coaster.

So here I am again, living on a food stamp budget... and again - we are doing with out lots.

When I first shopped, I didn't include my 2 1/2 year-old son in my budget - but my housemate jumped on board.

Then after much discussion we decided to include Connor because we face a reality that many on SNAP probably face...(more on that in a moment) and so we went back to the drawing board and "reshopped!"

So now, we are not only dealing with a very limited budget for two adults and a toddler - but also have to budget for the special dietary needs for Connor, my toddler son, who is a type 1 diabetic.

Now a whole new ball game, but most likely a reality that some SNAP families face!

With $62.70 - cash and not a penny more - we headed to the stores...

We shopped for Connor first; making sure we had the specialty items we felt he should and has to have for these five days... a little bit of real juice to treat low sugars; then a no sugar flavored drink for everyday drinking. Then his snacks, because he has to have snacks between meals and before bed to keep his sugars stable. Next breakfast... we had to go with his usual TLC breakfast bars instead of less expensive off-brands because the TLC bars have no added high fructose corn syrup, which drives his sugars up along with other breakfast foods for him. Anyway, the list goes on...

We figured about half of our budget would go for Connor's special needs. We paid for all of that first and then took it to the car so that we would know exactly to the penny how much we had left for the two of us...

$21.77 - for two adults for five days.

But then we decided to stash $10 - just in case Connor ran out of something or we needed something for him in an emergency.

$11.77 - for two adults for five days.

Bottom line...

We are missing meals.

Not eating what I want but probably what I need on the Texas Food Stamp Challenge

I've taken up the Texas Food Stamp Challenge to see if I can make it five days eating on the average daily “benefit” of someone receiving food stamps, now known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. For the first three days, I have a daily budget of $4.50/day. Because Congress is considering cutting the benefit when they reconvene after the election, my “benefit” reduces to $3.70/day for the last two days. 

After consulting numerous experts – my wife,Keren, who loves to cook, and Jerry, my friend who makes a habit of eating strange things (he's fanatic Irishman, a running fanatic, a fanatic mathematician, and a vegetarian) – about good nutrition on a limited budget, I headed to the grocery store Sunday and purchased the following items spending a mere $15.26 of my $20.90 budget for the week.

Organic Soy Milk (½ gal) $1.98

Peter Pan Peanut Butter (1 lb.) $1.58 (cheaper than the store brand!)

100% Whole Wheat Bread $1.48

Cabbage Head (2.6 lb.) $1.41

Cilantro (a bunch) $0.48

3 Bananas (1.25 lb.) $0.49 (on sale!)

1 Pound bulk rice $0.78

1 Pound Lentils $0.98

1 Pound Pinto Beans $0.68

1 Pound Garden Rotini $1.00

Oatmeal (18 oz) $1.18

Dozen Eggs $0.94

Coffee (11 oz. Grnd) $2.28

At Jerry's suggestion, I spent another $2.78 to buy broccoli, zucchini, some limes and a couple of apples. Apparently he thought a steady diet of beans, rice, and oatmeal might get a little boring.

So far, so good. The biggest problem has been my daughter, Grace, poaching off my plate. Breakfast and lunch have been pretty easy. Either oatmeal and banana (only a half though) or scrambled eggs and dry toast (Keren made some Mixed Berry Jam that I keep eying though.) Lunch has been a peanut butter and banana sandwich. (Today I made a fried egg sandwich... yum.) Add a little coffee and maybe some soy milk, and my meal cost for breakfast and lunch has been less than a dollar a day. Not bad.

Dinners have been fun. First day was lentils and rice topped with sauteed cabbage and onions. Sounds gross but it was actually pretty good. Grace said I should have done more cabbage. (Keren had a different opinion.) Last night was pasta with sauteed broccoli, zucchini and onions topped with some lime juice and some beans. (Is this the same as Cincinnati Chili?)

Someone asked me if I have been eating what I wanted on the Texas Food Stamp Challenge. I replied I had been getting everything I needed but not necessarily what I wanted. Since I'm preparing my meals at home, I'm probably eating a more balanced and healthier diet than I normally do. (Potato chips in my mind fit in nicely with a vegetarian diet, but I can't afford them on the challenge.) I've also cut out between meal snacks and desserts. Extravagances I want but can't afford. Maybe what I want really isn't what I need. I 'm feeling pretty good.

This evening it was beans and rice garnished with cilantro and a side dish of sweet and sour cabbage wedges. My after dinner snack was 8 oz of Soy Milk. I need the calories and protein. 

Grace and Keren decided to go to Thai Pepper (my favorite Thai food place in Lubbock) and bring their meal back so we could eat as a family. Their real motivation I suspect was to see if they could tempt me to cheat by eating off their plates. I offered them some of my cabbage instead.

David Weaver

South Plains Food Bank

Taking the Texas Food Bank Challenge

Vangelia Perryman, our SPFB e-communicator, called me today with an innocent question: “Hey David, I have a question...  Are you going to do the ‘Texas Food Bank Challenge?’” I said sure... what is it? 

The idea of the challenge is feed yourself for five days using the average daily amount available to people enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (formerly known as food stamps). The current benefit is $4.50 per day.

Of course there is a twist. Congress is currently considering cutting SNAP benefits to “pay” for the Child Nutrition Reauthorization Bill and some Medicaid funding.( I guess the idea is that hungry people won’t mind going a little hungerier to feed the poor.) So for two days, the benefit is reduced to $3.70  a day to reflect the impact of the Congressional Cuts. It didn’t take me long to realize that I would have $20.90 for food for five days.

“OK,” I thought. I can do that. Seventy-five percent of the people we serve at the South Plains Food Bank also receive SNAP benefits. I thought of the resources they tap into ranging from food boxes from our agencies, meals at soup kitchens, produce we give away from our farm and orchard. It shouldn’t be too hard.

Then Vangelia hit me with the “rules.” I can’t accept “charity” from friends, family, or even kind strangers. And I can only use food I purchase with my food stamp “allocation.” The real rules for people receiving food stamps are 1) you earn less than 130% of the federal poverty guidelines,  2) you have very limited assets, 3) you have been a U. S. citizen or legal immigrant for a least five years.

I protested that if charity is available to help food stamp recipients it should be available to me as well! Then she pointed out that I only qualify to receive food stamps on one point, I’ve been a US citizen for more than five years! “Use up your retirement account ,” she said,”sell your car get rid of your house and we can talk. Oh, and expect a pay cut!” Give me a break.

So now I’m planning my menu for the challenge. The reality of my spur of the moment decision is starting to sink in.  I won’t be stopping by Starbucks for a cup of Pikes Place this week. That’s nearly half my daily allocation. I might stop by McDonald’s because they give me the senior coffee special. (It’s irritating that they just assume I qualify... but that’s another story.) When the Congressional cuts come into play, I won’t even be able to do that. I may be pretty cranky by the end of the week.

I love to hear your thoughts and ideas on how I should plan for the challenge. I’m a vegetarian, I love chocolate (I even like chocolate drizzled on vegetables), and I like to run. If you were in my running shoes, how should I be planning to make it through the week on my Food Stamp Diet?

David Weaver

South Plains Food Bank

One in Six

Feeding America projects that one in six Americans are food insecure and may need assistance from Food Banks this year. That’s an incredible number… one that surely has to be wrong until I think about the increase in the number of people we have been serving in the past couple of years. Then I wonder if one in six is too conservative.
Recently I met a young professional volunteering at the food bank. Looking at him you would never think Mike had ever had a problem in his life. Handsome, confident, married with two beautiful young children. We talked about this and that and then I asked him why he was volunteering at the food bank. He got quiet… and began to tell his story.
 Mike’s parents divorced when he was in grade school. Although child support payments were few and far between, he never realized he was growing up “poor.” Mike told me he knew he had the “best” Mom in the world. She would let him and his brother eat oatmeal at dinner and sometimes popcorn for breakfast.
He didn’t understand that was all they had in their pantry.  He never noticed that his Mom didn't eat the oatmeal or popcorn. Later he would find out that his Mom would go two or three days skipping meals to make sure her children ate. He wished there had been a food bank to help when he was growing up.
One in six is unbelievable until you start talking with your neighbors who have been one of the “ones.”

This Guy

Officially, Denise is our Social Services Outreach Liaison for the South Plains Food Bank. What that means is she helps people navigate the “system” to get other kinds of food assistance for people beyond what we can provide through the Food Bank. Each month, Denise logs a bunch of miles as she reaches out to people in all the counties we serve. And as you know, in some parts of the South Plains we have miles and miles of miles and miles before the next town.

Toward the end of last month, Denise was contacted by a case worker for Lubbock MHMR asking if she would meet with one of their clients, a young man named Roy who recently moved to Lubbock to be close to his family.  Denise set up an appointment to meet with Roy. Here is her story about meeting “This Guy”:

When I arrived for our appointment I met “this guy.” He is the sweetest young man with nicest manner you could ask for. He had just moved here from New York. His mother had remarried a man from Lubbock. His MHMR worker was helping him with transition. Even with help from MHMR, it has been a difficult adjustment.

On one of his visits, Roy case worker from MHMR could tell that Roy wasn’t eating right. Most of the fixed income he receives was going to help pay rent and purchase medicines with precious little left over for food.

I helped him fill out an application for food-stamps. He kept repeating over and over, “Mam, are you sure? Are you sure this is ok? If someone else needs it, I don’t have to get it.” I reassured him it was ok and that he deserved it too.

To make a long story short, Roy qualified for food stamps.  After his first trip to the grocery store, he called me and said, “Thank you! I got to eat today!”

And… well, even though the days are sometimes long and the miles go on and on, I totally forget about all of that. I am thankful for the Lord placing me here to help people like “This Guy!”

 

 According to the Feeding America Hunger Study released earlier this year, the South Plains Food Bank and our network of partner agencies will touch 84,000 people in some form or fashion this year. Knowing “This Guy” is one of them keeps our work real.

Hope

Monday I visited with a boy at a local Boys and Girls Club here in Lubbock. We are currently working on a video project for the Food Bank, so there was another staff member with me as well as our camera man.

As this young man and I continued to visit he really began to open up about what a difficult time his mother has been having since she lost her job. And then I heard him say something that I just couldn't believe.

"I didn't eat yesterday," he said as if talking about the weather. "I didn't eat at all yesterday until I came here for breakfast."

He hadn't eaten because it had been Sunday and the Summer Feeding Program at the Boys and Girls Club where he attends during the week had been closed for the weekend.

This video project has opened my eyes to a whole new world - a family of seven living in a three bedroom 700 sq.ft. house; having to make choices EVERYDAY between food and gas in the car to go look for a job - between food and rent - between food and activities for the kids - between food and school supplies. This project has introduced me to grandparents and parents who sacrifice themselves; go to bed hungry; do whatever it takes so their little ones have a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs, and food in their bellies.

I have found some who are not able to provide even the basics. I have sat in households where two meals a day is considered a treat and water is not just used to hydrate the kids as they play, but also a cheap way to trick their tummies into thinking they are full.

Today I sat down a cried because I have so little to give. But when I explain services to them and they realize we have a school supply drive coming up, and there are places were they can get some school clothes for their children, and that there is help available I know I am able to give them something.

The only thing I can give them is hope. I can only give that to them because of the kindness of everyone of you who gives food, gives money, gives time, and gives your voice to the South Plains Food Bank and our more than 220 agencies.

Free Food

The Lubbock Avalanche Journal published an article about the Summer Food Service Program provided by the South Plains Food Bank. It provides summer meals for children in need at sites like Boys and Girls Clubs, YWCA, and day camps in low income neighborhoods.

Funding for the program comes through the Texas Department of Agriculture and USDA.  Below the online version of the article one person wrote a comment called “Free Food: I sure hope none of their parents have cell phones, cable TV, laptops, brand new cars, drink beer or smoke.” Those aren’t questions we ask of the kids when they come to the sites. All we know is that we want to provide nutritious meals for kids who would do without regardless of what their parents or grandparents have or don’t have.

The term “Free Food” caught my attention. Food Banks and our agencies don’t distribute “free food.” There really is not a free lunch. But there is food freely given.

Roughly 40% of the food we distribute comes through federal programs such as TEFAP. Those programs assist low income children, seniors, homeless, and working families. Like most federal nutrition programs, they reflect our nation’s values that we provide a safety net for the most vulnerable and also support our nation’s farmers to insure food security at a reasonable price for all of us.

But 60% of the food we distribute comes from private donations from individuals, grocers in our community, and national food manufacturers who give through Feeding America. It is food that helps people in our communities —people on the cusp of food security. This food fills the hunger gap when the pantry is empty. Sometimes it’s enough. Sometimes it’s not.

The reasons people are hungry and food and insecure are myriad. Economic forces are at work over which they have no control. People make poor life choices which are totally within their control. There are physical and mental challenges that leave people unable to provide for themselves for a while… or for a life time. We can’t ever solve all the situations that create food insecurity and hunger for our friends and neighbors. But here’s what I know:  if people are hungry, they don’t have the strength to overcome the forces at work on them, robbing them of dignity, hope and the ability to change their lives if they can. You and I can do something to change that.

People give food to the hungry for many reasons, reflecting a range of values. No one makes them do it. It is food freely given much like grace. I’m pretty sure I don’t understand grace… or why people give food to feed their neighbors. But both are freely given and I am grateful.