The Grapes of Wrath

Link: http://firefliesandbonfires.com/dust_bowl_memoir.html

Watched The Grapes of Wrath this past weekend and have been struggling a bit with the hot acid that comes with personal memories of that time. (See link above for what I have written in the past.)

Of course the compelling message in the story is not of the abuse of the poor but of the unyielding spirit of life that is in all of us, and of course "the kindness of strangers."  There were and are now those who are observing and acting in so many ways to counter the effects of man's too frequent inhumanity.

At the time the book was written I was a member of  that alien race, the poor, that many of the time proposed were poor only because of inferior genes.  (Herber Hoover was forced to apologize to the Eugenics Society for implying that all a child needed to grow into a succesful adult was an adequate diet.)

Ten short years later I was awash in offers of full scholarships from numerous high end universities, the kind strangers who saw value and promise.

Yet the sour hot still fills my throat when I recall the early times. I dread it but I am grateful for it too.  It is the cornerstone of empathy that sustains my connections to the diverse lives with whom I share this planet..