30 Days of Thankfulness- Food

We are all going to eat a lot today. Some of us more than others. I hope I can at least enjoy lunch (I've been having trouble eating lately.) What are some of the things you will be eating today? Brandon and I will be attending three separate family gatherings, starting with lunch at my grandparents'. Here is a list of some of the stuff that will be or could be offered, just off the top of my head (and not including breakfast):

Turkey
Stuffing
Corn
Mashed potatoes
Green beans
Rolls
Broccoli casserole
Gravy
Cranberry sauce
Sweet potatoes
Pies pies pies

I will probably have a very full tummy today. I'm blessed that even when my pantry is rather bare by our standards, there are still things to eat. I'm not really starving- I just am not in the mood to eat a box of Rice-A-Roni, you know? But there is always food in my house. Chances are, there is always food in your house, too, even if it isn't what you want to eat.

There are three grocery stores within five minutes of my house. One is gigantic, the other two are pretty good sized. The shelves are stocked, and there are plenty of options available, from the cheapest box of corn muffin mix to the most expensive cut of beef. I could buy things in bulk (a gallon of nondescript chocolate pudding, for instance), or I can buy individually wrapped single-serving packages. We are surrounded by an overwhelming amount of food. We can visit all-you-can-eat buffets and view in one room more food that some people will see in a lifetime. We are surrounded by food- healthy and unhealthy, "whole" and processed, organic and chemical-covered. We can choose to go vegetarian or vegan, gluten-free or dairy-free, because of all the options that are available to us.

I guess we are so used to having food all around us that we've grown complacent. We have no problem throwing away food. In the United States, we throw away almost half the food we purchase- over $150,000,000,000 in food annually. Did you catch all those zeroes? That means billions. Billions of dollars. I'm sure some of that was for legitimate reasons, like meat that went bad or vegetables that wilted. But you know most of that was just waste. I made myself oven fries the other day for lunch, and I threw away my leftovers. I have seen a disturbing amount of uneaten fast food in our trash cans at work. I read a book recently where the author said she fixed fish fillets for her children for dinner, and they threw them away because they were out of ketchup. Six perfect fish fillets, thrown into the garbage can. I'm not judging those kids. We ALL do it. We all throw stuff away.

I don't know what we should do instead. Maybe we should buy smaller portions, so we don't end up throwing stuff away? I'm not sure. What I do know, though, is that today, out of a global population of 7 billion people, about a billion of them are hungry. I know that malnutrition and hunger are responsible for about a third of all child deaths annually. Every five seconds, a child dies of hunger or malnutrition. Children and adults in the poorest parts of the world are literally eating dirt because they do not have food to eat. My sponsor child in Indonesia, when eating with her family, basically only consumes rice, and maybe some freshly caught fish or fruit if she's lucky. Sixty-two percent of the children attending public school in my district qualify for the free or reduced lunch programs. If those programs didn't exist, they wouldn't eat. And who knows if they would have food waiting for them when they get home from school? Considering at least a tenth of them have been homeless at some point in the last year, probably a good number of them would be very hungry if it wasn't for these lunch programs. Nationally, one in five children struggle with hunger every day.

As you sit down with your families today to fill your belly full of whatever it is you may be eating, take a moment to say a word of thanks for your full plate. If you end up with a tummy ache later in the day because you ate too much, let that serve as a reminder of how fortunate we are. If you become overwhelmed with the family aspect of the holidays (whether cooking and cleaning is stressing you out, or you're in for some awkward or unpleasant conversation today), remember those who are not fortunate enough to gather with their families and share a meal- because they have nothing to share.