[Magdalen] Lottery tickets

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

Your thoughtful post brought back some warm memories of the place where I
first had a job, in the eastern side of Dutchess County, in Harlem Valley
Psychiatric Center. "Eastern Dutchess" (ED) is the name for the region
among the haves of western Dutchess County.  The folks of ED come from a
long line of farmers, and they showed it.  They didn't usually have much in
the way of money, but it was really neat to see how they networked with
their neighbors, most of whom were also cousins, to get whatever they
needed. Some of them had boats, and the story was usually the same. They
bought cheap of broken down hulk, or just got it by agreeing to haul it
away, then, between them and their neighbors (cousins) they built a great
boat they could take the family out on.
People didn't go to a garage when the car broke down; they went to the
go-to car repair neighbor (cousin) and gradually found used parts for what
they needed, and then bartered to get the work done. The same went for
repairs around the house, such as a new furnace, a new roof, etc., etc. You
could generally find some neighbor (cousin) who could get the job done, and
the work was paid for via barter and stored up favors.
These were hard-working people, and truly good people.  It was a real
privilege and also a learning experience to be employed there.
The State had a facility for developmentally disabled people and a facility
for the mentally ill, and it provided employment that kept things running.
When the State decided to close harlem Valley Psychiatric Center, it
destroyed the economic support for the region.  folks who had been driving
fifteen minutes to work, and were near home, should their kids need
anything, suddenly had to drive an hour to get to where their jobs had
moved.  It took a few years for it all to collapse.
I'm sure there still are folks there, living pretty much the way they
always have, but with fewer others to draw on, fewer resources, but, hey,
life goes on...


James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy

On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 11:12 AM, Jim Guthrie <jguthrie at pipeline.com> wrote:

> One aspect of this stems from the immigrant mindset . . .
>
> Hotel and Motel help varies from venue to venue. Smaller mom-chains are
> often family affairs, whether East Indian or African American or Asian or
> Hispanic.
>
> Like many bodegas and other small businesses (especially run by
> immigrants), families work cheap and communal sharing of expenses and the
> like often allows wealth accumulation. A family -- 2-3 generations can run
> the shop and have no problems taking "sleep shifts" in a small apartment
> that might have 8-10 residents. Thus, bringing in outsiders becomes a huge
> financial burden,while a decent small apartment may often be better,
> cleaner and more healthful than housing wherever they came from.
>
> Of course, Americans often can;t grasp what happens when poor rural folk
> get attracted to cities, living in apparent squalor, but the attraction is
> two-fold: It's easier to eke out a living in the densely packed
> appalling-looking places that elicit so much sympathy (but little realistic
> help) from the developed world, but the more important one is people pool
> information, resources and ideas -- and scrape together enough for one or
> more family members to emigrate, and to better themselves might start a
> small business or start working in one with emigrants who've gone before.
>
> And as the earlier operators move up the ladder -- say from a bodega to a
> motel, the next wave takes over the old store.
>
> This entrepreneurial spirit with single-minded goals of acquiring wealth
> (which then helps bring others over friends and relatives from the slums
> of, say, Kalkota) is far different than the American native-born idea of
> get a job and a paycheck and simply struggle along, say with one or two
> people eking out a living on minimum wage, living in American squalor with
> a small family and no comprehension of what it takes to improve their
> situation.
>
> In a sense, some American Conservatives have this right, i think, though
> they are complete failures at coming up with approaches to solve this
> dilemma. Liberals do better at figuring out short term alleviation of
> despair through housing, feeding and other programs, but there's almost
> nothing there aimed at providing a long-term solution to poverty.
>
> Cheers,
> Jim
>