Cold

Its cold out. Bitter. Just about as bad as it gets in these parts in the average year. I used to love winter, the cold, and I guess I still do. But I can't forget about my friend Curtis. He told me to leave stuff for him at the gas station if he wasn't there. I left him a few jackets and some gloves. I hope he got them.

I am very conscious of the cold weather now, how it affects the homeless, or even families that can't pay their gas bills.

But really, the fact is, I know little of their pain.

I left the thermostat on cool last night on accident. The stupid thing doesn't have an auto switch.

Needless to say (unless you aren't from Houston, then I do need to say it) it was 58 degrees inside when I woke up this morning. I was wrapped up in 3 blankets so I was fine.

I started thinking how tough it must be to sleep outside on nights like these. Cold, maybe damp concrete. Nothing but your jacket to keep you warm. Trying to find the most windless place in the city. At the same time avoiding the cops. I think I need to sleep downtown soon.

Isn't it funny how we won't help the homeless, but then we take it a step further and make it illegal for them to live the way they live, when most of them don't have other options.

I hope Curtis got his jackets, it was 45 out last time I saw him and his heaviest clothing was a flannel shirt.

Its getting cold enough to die. Not just misery, but death. I wonder how cold it has to be before the human body can't survive 12 hours in the elements.

So what, people are freezing, what can I do about it?

I can help Curtis sure, and some others. But in the end how much am I doing?

I got to thinking yesterday, reports guess that around 1% of the US population will experience homelessness in a year. Thats crazy. 3 million people will experience homelessness this year?
Seems like a a lot.

Then you realize that 20% of America makes more than 75k a year as a family. I don't even make it into that category and I know I could live off of half of my income easily.

So what if those 20% started helping out the 1%. That means 20 of the upper classers help out each homeless person.

20-1 So if each of those 20 could find just a thousand dollars a year to give...

That would mean that the lower class would be eliminated as far as the government defines it.

One of my favorite stats I think I heard from Tony Campolo, a brilliant and controversial sociologist from Eastern University.

He first defines extreme poverty. It is considered poverty in which a person has a chance of dying because of a lack of access to necessary resources due to poverty.

Then he quotes some number. This number he says, is the amount of money it would take every year to end extreme poverty. The number seems huge, I want to say 300 billion or something.

Then he goes on to explain that between the US and Europe, nearly the same amount of money was spent on ice cream last year...

Ouch...

I can't do too much for the big scheme of things by myself.

I can make a huge impact on a few peoples lives. Which is all I'm called to do. If we would all start realizing this we could end hunger, we could end water related disease, we could end AIDS.

But we find comfort in knowing that we never have to try to help out and we take the humanity out of homelessness. Its easy to ignore when I can't attach a face to it.

After all, how much of an impact can I make?