A Test of Human Metal

I've long held an ardent belief that adversity builds character... and swiftly sifts the chaff from the wheat where human behaviors and outlooks are concerned. Take, for example, poverty...

First of all, what we in U.S. society regards as "being impoverished" is a picnic in the park compared to the true, stark poverty millions upon millions of our fellow human beings endure each and every day of their imperiled lives. The closest thing to this type of catastrophic impoverishment that we have by comparison in this nation are our homeless people and people eeking out a borderline starvation existence in remote areas such as stricken Appalachian regions.

Even though in my childhood Momma, my siblings, and I "qualified" six ways to Sunday as "poor" by American standards, we never saw it that way. Even if we had no gas or electricity and certainly never a telephone or a car, we had a roof over our heads, a place to grow a garden, and most of all - each other. As far as we were concerned then and to this day, these things made us wealthy beyond measure.

Now, staring hard at 60 years of age, I still regard those times as foundational for developing and honing ever-improving coping skills, perseverance in the face of adversity, true independence, and exceeding resourcefulness in exploring alternative options when slugging your way through hard times of any kind in adult life. You see the same phenomenon in the now elderly generation who "made their bones" by soldiering through The Great Depression even as their far wealthier counterparts leapt from Wall Street skyscraper windows.

When it comes to the "Have" vs. the "Have Not" people in life, I see the former, on the whole, as decidedly more disadvantaged - in a vast number of the most humanitarily and spiritually crucial ways - than the collective latter. When it comes to true adversity, be it in one's personal life, relationship/societal interactions, and/or financial state of affairs, my money's on the "Have Nots" being more likely to stay the course and cross the finish line every time.

My best friend got a good laugh the other day when, after sharing the above thoughts with him, I asserted, "Take the coming economic recession, for example. We poor people aren't all that concerned about it, save for the higher food and gasoline prices, because we're so damn resourceful and adaptive. It's the well-heeled folks who'll 'suffer' the most... the only way we financially challenged folks realize we're in a Recession is when we see more rich folks in the Dollar Store!"

Even if I ever do hit the Lottery or otherwise back into wealth, I'll never forget where I came from. And that will keep me a decent human being.