Coexistence

We who live in affluent places during affluent times have perhaps heard of the poverty which is a reality in places far away from us, but not many of us have had the opportunity to experience it up close. Still more rare are those who choose of their own accord to leave the comfort of home and willingly plunge themselves into the squalor that is the norm for so many in our world.

It's easy to hide behind all kinds of excuses. One actually can train the mind to shut out such poverty, believing rather that there is some kind of psychological game afoot, but in this place, a different tune is being played.

There are those, even here, who have all that they can possibly want, and more. There are those, even here, who are part of the ever-expanding middle class, but there are still those (and there are lots of these) who remain trapped in the rhelm of the forgotten, the outcasts, the unmentionables.

Poverty, true poverty, lives side by side with utter affluence in this land. Only mere feet from the manicured lawns and fountains that decorate the grounds of some of the lux accommodations for travellers, there are shanty towns where people live 'neath corrigated steel roofs, in shacks which are made of bricks if they are lucky, or tents which hang precariously on poles for those who must. Yet I wonder whether even some of these would say that they are happy, having discovered the secret to true happiness, the kind that realizes the minimal worth of physical possessions when compared with the true blessing of friendship and loyalty. If one has discovered this secret, 'things' tend to take care of themselves, but if one neglects this lesson, there can never be enough 'things' to satisfy the longing of the soul.

It's easy for an outsider to reflect on the lessons that can be learned from the apparent dualities that society imposes, but no doubt there are other realities, other circumstances, other truths that created this reality, that enforce it even now, that make the dream of equality for all a very slow and at times painful process.

Perhaps the true lesson here is the discovery that we make about ourselves when we're confronted with the truth of wealth (in whatever form it comes), and dare to allow our souls to be touched by those who speak, sometimes with no words, bt always with their hearts.