"Frog Hospital" And "Pax On Both Houses" Discuss "Poverty Is A Misfortune"

"A Full Belly Does Not Believe In Hunger"

Italian Proverb

Fred Owens· 

Poverty Is A Misfortune

By Fred Owens
Journalist, author, gardener

Poverty is a misfortune, it does not provoke nobility or generosity. It must be accepted, endured, fought, and overcome.

Poverty is no blessing, except in the larger sense that all life is a blessing, or pancreatic cancer is a blessing. Certainly one can learn from the experience. One can exhibit grace.

But to say, Wouldn't it be fun to be poor?, is like saying, Wouldn't it be fun to be sick?

One does chose the state of poverty as better than a dishonorable life, but one does not seek it for its own sake. Poverty is not simple living. In fact, it can be both immensely complicated and continuously boring.

But simple living is a happy state. Defined as this: You are living simply if your income is greater than your expenses. Poverty is the reverse of that condition.

Fred Owens is a former La Conner resident and journalist-and-author-turned-gardener now living in Santa Barbara, Calif. His book, Frog Hospital, explores Skagit Valley's more lurid history with a focus on La Conner's historical "Fishtown" artist colony.

Comments

Great reflection! Although happiness usually depends on income being greater than reasonable-and-necessary expenses, it is also true that the hugely-disproportionate amount of wealth sequestered by America's 1% does not contribute to their happiness (nor often their children's happiness) while shunting the unhappiness of real economic distress on "the poor" and "the lower middle class." http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/05/50000-may-be-new-happiness-tipping-point.html