The first of the month was practically a holiday.  In addition to government help, my mom would receive checks from the Navy and the Coast Guard to help provide for her children. Dad had served in both branches, and both branches honored their commitment to care for the children of the fallen.  The exact amount was never on my radar.  All I knew and all my siblings knew was that we could go to the store and filled up the cart and maybe, if we were good, go out to eat at McDonald’s.  That was our one day of living high on the hog. 

If Steve, the mailman, had not delivered the mail by 3:30, we kids were sent on a mission to find him, ask for our mail, and sprint back home where mom would be waiting to take the checks downtown and cash them before the banks closed at 4.  Timing was of the essence.  If we were late, if the banks closed, then we would have to go up on the hill where my grandparents lived to eat.  At gramma and grampa’s house, there was always enough, even when there wasn’t. 

Despite the growing number of years between those moments and now, I cannot pretend that the anxiety of potentially not having enough has left me.  I carry it with me still as I regard the wife and three children God has blessed me with – the family I am charged with providing for.  It is serious.  They absolutely depend on me.  I stand between them and going without, and it is a duty that consumes me daily.  I cannot forget.  How could I? 

I recall a short time after my father’s illness prompted him to return to his own parents an experience that underscored my family’s struggle in ways that affect me today.  I was told by my teacher that there was to be a party.  Each child had to bring something from home – something to pass around, share.  Like most kids who had yet to hit double digits, I informed my poor mother on the day of the party.  We were standing in the kitchen.  Her face turned pale.  I remember how she opened one cupboard after another, each one empty.  Empty.  There was nothing to grab, nothing to eat.  Until she opened one cupboard and found some pears my grandmother had canned.  “Take this,” she said, giving me the only thing she could find. 

I took the canned peaches to school and presented it to my teacher who told me that I had been mistaken.  The party today was for the other fourth-grade class, not mine.  Ours was the following week.  And there, in front of my entire class, holding the one item my mother could find, I burst into tears.  I bawled my eyes out.  Not because there would be no party that day.  But because I had an epiphany.  A sad realization.  I suddenly knew that we were poor.  It had all added up in a single, heart-wrenching moment. 

Here is a poem I wrote.  I hope it lands well. 

Groceries 

Our small kitchen would be 

crowded with bulging 

brown paper bags –   

on countertops, on 

cushion-less chairs, left 

by the open backdoor because they 

were too heavy and our arms too little –  

these groceries, bagged 

promises of full tummies, 

purchased on the first of the month 

after we intercepted the mailman because 

the banks would close soon, and we had 

ketchup and an egg – mom 

rushing, signing, finally ordering the 

five of us to the running car. 

What jubilation, what joy, we, 

the sometimes desperate 

*** 

My youngest, Marianna, sits buckled in her 

car seat and looks at the 

groceries in front of her. 

“You went to the sto-ah?” she asks sweetly. 

I take no small moment 

before I say, “Yes”, then shift into 

first and take us 

where we need to go.