Letter from the Trenches: Coming to terms with the war on poverty *OR* Birthday Wishes for my Son

As some of you may recall, I had a difficult time with Festus' first birthday. We've now passed his second birthday with a much different reaction. I've been quite happy thinking about Festus getting older and becoming more independent. On our last visit he and I played for about an hour and it was wonderful. None of the soul crushing existential crises nor ennui I have feared was present. Instead he was an energetic little boy, nearly two years old, who laughed and giggled with surprising regularity.

I now look forward to the next visit and the chance to celebrate his birthday with him this month. Athena will ill during that last visit which should make this one a nice chance to catch up and see how much he's talking now.

Indeed the only sadness I contend with now doesn't have much to do with Festus, though it does reflect new light upon the choice to place him with his parents for adoption. It has been a slow dawning realization that his placement was not made only of willful choice, but also of necessity. Despite my desire to believe the opposite I now see that I did not have the resources to raise him had I chosen to do so. Even though I am setting the bar for my personal standards of financial well being I can see that Athena and I simply don't have the resources to achieve solvency. Further, that isn't just financial resources.

I have returned to work after yet another four months of seasonal leave. Already I don't want to be there. I won't get into gory details. Instead I'll say that the environment in which I work engenders distrust, waste, frustration, and disillusion. It seems I return each day to work with a little less than I had the day before. Yet I make just enough money that I can't manage to keep a savings account going. In short, I have no cushion for attempting a transition that seems desperately needed. I could attempt to make the transition anyway and hope all works out for the best, but I there are people depending on me for their health and financial stability. This is the trap of poverty and responsibility.

What I hope for Festus is that he doesn't have to deal with this sort of trap. I hope that by placing him with Prof Plum and Ms Scarlet that he will never have the deficit of resources that so many people in the USA now contend with. I wish him happiness, health, and the freedom to truly do whatever compels him in this world. And teddy bears and trucks, of course. He is, after all, only two years old!