Happy Thanksgiving

Yesterday I went into a natural food store. I love going into this store. I buy milk there, in the glass bottles which remind me of when I was younger and the milkman twice a week left our order by the front door. I buy yogurt there and cheese. I can always find vegetable broth in the big cartons. The produce is organic and the meat is free range and hormone-free, the breads whole-wheat and natural, boasting no preservatives. I know this food must be good for you. And yesterday it was brought home to me- only the well to do can afford to eat these healthy foods.
The woman in line in front of me was buying a fresh 12 pound turkey. The cash register: $51.53.
Fifty dollars for a turkey.
My frozen turkey, bought at Piggly Wiggly, was $7.87. Full of hormones, I’m sure, and probably raised on a turkey-mill farm. But affordable to many.
I was stunned, to be sure. Then I looked at the people around me, buying last minute Thanksgiving goodies. WASPs, all of them. White Anglo Saxon Princes and Princesses. Well-dressed- and I know this because they wore very expensive shoes….Danskos and Naots and Keens and Merrells….( I’d just been in the shoe store next door which, once upon a time, used to carry shoes which were much less than $259 and $112 on sale). The women carried expensive handbags in their manicured hands. No one was overweight. Everyone looked well-cared for.
They carried their purchases, in environmentally friendly reusable bags, out to Mercedes and Volvos. Not one car in the parking lots showed rust. None of the cars looked older than 5 years. None were held together with baling wire and pop rivets. Only the well-to- do can afford to visit this store.
But even in the chain grocery stores the more healthy foods are expensive. Whole-wheat bread is more expensive than the white type. Hormone-free eggs are more expensive than the Piggly Wiggly brand. Vegetables marked “organic” cost almost twice as much as the ones without that designation. Brown rice is pricey.
So you’re poor and you have a limited budget. You have a family to feed and you must take a bus or walk to the grocery store. The “health food” grocery stores in my region are not located in poor neighborhoods. Neither are the farmer’s markets. Neither are the truck farm stands, set up by local farmers, on little vacant lots or in church parking lots, offering fresh, locally grown produce.
Fifty dollars for a turkey. At least that store collects donations to our local food bank.
This Thanksgiving I’m thankful for my health and that of my family and friends. I’m grateful my family has steady jobs. I’m glad I have a church community where my liberal ideas are not only welcomed, but encouraged. That I’ve found friends with whom I laugh and cry. And that I do not have to battle poverty in order to make sure my family lives in a safe and healthful place. Even if we will be eating a seven dollar turkey chock full of hormones.