Homelessness

By Mrs. Barbara McCain

Recently, after viewing a commentary concerning the plight of one homeless family, I had a rather startling, but simplistic idea form within my mind, "Where are the grandparents of that family?"

The more I thought about that question, the more searching it became and the more it decried many facets of modern American life.  The question enlarged itself and began to cry out, "Where are the grandparents, the parents, the aunts, the uncles, the sisters, the brothers and the children of these homeless?" 

And added to that list was the nagging thought, "What has happened to American family love and loyalty?"

It was not too many years ago, that families were considered units of confirmed loyalty and permanence.  During pioneer days if Uncle Howard's house burned down, he and his family lived with their relatives until the entire community could join together in raising the walls of a new home.  It did not matter if Uncle Howard's brother had only a three room log house, room was found in that special condition called "togetherness" that tragedy and need often builds.  No one begrudged the fact that the chicken had to be stretched further in a watery stew.  They were just grateful to share.  During times of early settlements, the fever ridden colonist knew their children would be cared for and taken into the home of another, just because of love, decency and honor, even if death were to make that taking permanent.  On the plains, in the midst of winter, entire tribes shared equally so that all could survive.  In the depression, many a young couple moved in with their parents and were never made to feel the worse for it.  There was a source of dignity and pride that was called "unconditional love" that abounded in America.  It encompassed a wide scope.  It meant if little cousin Lydia's parents died out west, she was brought home with love and affection and made one of your own.  It meant if Aunt Sally had an illness that caused her to lose all reason, she was patiently cared for and protected within the family and hopefully brought through the crisis.  It even meant if Brother John became an alcoholic, you took off from work and spent anguished hours seeing him through the withdrawal and making certain he knew you were there for him to keep him straight.  It meant if a son was "down on his luck," you flung open the doors of your home and welcomed him in with a warm embrace, no questions asked, until he was ready to receive your counsel and help to get his feet firmly planted on the ground again.  Home was always the place you could "go home to," and family was always there to help.

How many heartwarming stories have we read of the jobless GI and his bride living with Mom and Dad until they found a job and place of their own, even if a little one joined the group.  Did that stop happening after World War II?  Did it somehow become "unfashionable" to be lovingly supportive of each other?  In my own family, I can not imagine one of my children not knowing that they could pick up the phone and place a collect phone call from anywhere, knowing that the voice on the other end would say, "I'll come and get you, son."  That does not lower my expectation views of my grown children, or my desire for them to be independent, or their need to form their own identity.  It does mean that family is always a reality, under girded by unconditional love and a common respect that says, "I will care for you."  I also know that my parents would do the same for me.  It is not a question of whether or not they would, I know.

No matter how poor we are, there should always be a place of caring and love that says, "I will be here for you.  Come on in, we will share what little we have and survive together."  It has happened for generations, it  has been part of what made America the land it is today.  Perhaps it should happen again.  Have many of us forgotten that we are a land of immigrants, who were all "taken in" in time of need, if not by someone else, then by the land herself?  To imagine myself sitting comfortably within four walls of my home, no matter how small or how large, and knowing that a son or daughter, aunt or uncle, mother or father, sister or brother, was out there without home or hope seems unconscienable.  If it were my son, I could not rest a day until I had searched the highways and byways and found him to bring him home.  But then, maybe I would not have to search, because with God's help, he would always know where to find me, where to find home.