Thinking Much About Nothing

Recently, I have been doing a lot of thinking about “nothing.” I remembered the television comedy “Seinfeld” that has been described as “the show about nothing.” I considered that in developed nations the true meaning of the word is often neglected in order to “make a point.” At the risk of sounding a tad sexist, many husbands have experienced their wives standing in front of a closet jammed tight with clothing and exclaiming, “I have nothing to wear!” I am certain that many of us parents and grandparents have witnessed a child standing in front of a filled refrigerator while whining, “there is nothing to eat.” When my wife and I were first married and we had not developed the skills to communicate properly, we often retreated into silence when we felt wounded by the other. The offending party would invariably ask, “what’s wrong?” and the reply would invariably be a terse “nothing!”

I have recently thought that we are very fortunate to live in a country that is so economically developed that “nothing” has lost its literal meaning. In the United States, when a family is considered to have nothing, social welfare provides a monthly check to help with the family’s expenses, food stamps are provided to help feed the family, in the public school system their children receive free education, and Medicaid covers close to 100% of the family’s medical expenses. Additionally, there are school programs that supply needy students with free lunch and families can make use of government subsidized housing.

In one of the recent reports on poverty published by the Census Bureau, the living conditions of households living bellow the poverty line were described in detail. In 99% of all households fitting that description there is at least one color television and 97% of these households own at least one VCR or DVD player. The average living area of these homes is larger than that enjoyed by most middle class people in most European capitals. The children of the poor in our country are rarely undernourished. As a matter of fact some studies have determined that they are better nourished than many of the children of families with a higher income level. A safe architectural structure, a motorized vehicle, potable water and electric power are almost taken for granted.

Alas, not so in Haiti or in many of the 17 countries we serve. The word “nothing” there has a much more dire connotation. Nothing there means a hovel of cardboard, plastic, rusted metal, little ventilation and muddy floors. Nothing there means no food and no running water, accompanied by the piercing cries of children from hunger or illness. Nothing there means that even when medical care is available for their children, they cannot make use of it for they do not have the few pennies for bus-fare to travel the distance. Nothing is going into a wretched lean-to and seeing one child eating a small bowl of plain rice with another watching woefully who explains, “today is not my turn to eat.” Nothing is keeping children from school because they do not own the required shoes or uniform, even when the schooling is free. Nothing is depriving a little girl of an education, not to mention a childhood, because her “job” is to walk for miles daily to fetch a 50 lb. bucket of water that turns out to be contaminated anyway. Nothing is when a mother has lost two of her three children to poverty and is holding the third in her arms, dehydrated and feverish, bathing him with her tears.

But the worst problem of living under the tyranny of “nothing,” generation after generation, is that, eventually, their hopes and aspirations start disappearing and their ability to dream for the future all but vanishes. We cannot allow this to happen! The prophet Isaiah wisely said, “without a dream the people will perish.”

“It is up to us, even while facing these harsh economic times in our country, even in these days of fear and uncertainty, to make every effort to save those who are at risk of dreamlessness, to rescue those who are dwelling on the brink of despair… on the brink of true nothingness. Great will be your reward!”