Taking and Giving Our Share

2018 Piney Woods Journal Submission

Most of us occasionally eat at restaurants that offer buffet-type dining. Whether these are pizza, Mexican, Chinese, or other dining places, buffets are popular. They provide customers with freedom of choice among diverse food options and the quantity of these that we desire.

A month or so ago, I went for lunch to a well-known pizza restaurant chain in the area. It was typically crowded on a Sunday with many families there for lunch, many apparently there after church services. As I finished eating and left the buffet area, it was amazing to see the quantity of left-over items still on many of the yet-to-be gathered plates there.

Many of those with Depression-era, or just frugal, parents probably have a visceral reaction when we see this. We think back to our parents telling us to eat our served portions and avoid selecting more food than we could consume in a meal. We remember their admonitions such as "Don't let your eyes be bigger than your stomach,” or “Think of the starving children in China.” We encounter somewhat different cultural norms now, but still we see plenty of folks living "high on the hog" while many others continue to have a "hard time making ends meet."

Largely gone are strong reminders of the days of the public health movement, replaced decades ago by the era of health services marketing. Also largely forgotten by most are home economics and home demonstration programs offered by state governments and utility companies to educate rural residents on food and energy conservation. Home demonstration associations, clubs and agents numbered in the many thousands in the Deep South long ago. Their mission was to provide community resources and instruction on topics such as diet and health, food production and preservation, landscaping, garment selection and making, and many other public concerns.

The long-term perspective that created many more public schools, public libraries, and the interstate highway system also seems left behind. My grandfather and his brothers in Winn Parish were big proponents of the “good roads and schools” movement of an even earlier era and eagerly supported Huey Long, O.K. Allen, and other populists in the initial decades of the twentieth century. We can easily see evidence today on a national, state, and local level of our crumbling infrastructure, and we know that we critically need to reinvest in updated versions of this public infrastructure. We have long heard talk about infrastructure investments, but there appear very limited actions yet.

Our social and moral infrastructure is also being challenged when public progress is impeded or delayed by power conflicts among politicians and interest groups who can seem to be prioritizing their private benefits. Cynicism is easy, but it helps create more distrust and difficulties in the difficult work of negotiating necessary changes. Cynicism further erodes public trust when perceived corruption elsewhere seems to justify our own personal, if seemingly much smaller, abuses of public trust. At a certain point, public trust and institutions can completely crumble as corruption and factionalism create anarchy. People then often turn to authoritarian leaders who promise “to make the trains run on time.”

Actions emphasizing conservation and sustainability of our natural environment are an important part of the necessary renewal of our public and moral infrastructures. We can all take small steps at least to practice conservation of our precious natural resources that we still have. Restaurants can do so with their food waste policies and practices. We can do so as well, and our actions can positively influence family members and friends.