What Do You Give When You Have Nothing Left to Give?

The Gift of Empty Pockets

Photo by Johann Walter Bantz on Unsplash

I was raised to give when I don’t have.

It was an instruction inscribed in the soil, as deep as my soul.

We were not rich, by any stretch of the imagination.

The house I grew up in was a chorus of donated clothes and tattered hope. But what we did not have in goods, we had in spirit.

I recall Sunday night dinners, the smell of Mom’s famous spaghetti sauce in the small apartment. We’d cram ourselves into the creaking kitchen table, a motley crew of aunts, uncles, cousins and neighbours.

Everyone brought something.

A dish to eat, a tale to share, a joke to give.

Even when they did not have their cupboards stocked, they left the gift of themselves.

I watched Mom drop some floppy dollars in Mrs. Rodriguez’s purse when she thought nobody was home. I witnessed Dad working for hours mending Mr Garcia’s leaking roof, sweaty hands, resolute spirit.

They gave not out of abundance but in need. The need for human connection, for common burdens and victories. Tha…