Poverty, Bubbles, And The Line
I sat there in the passenger seat of my buddy Don’s car. He was in the drivers seat but we weren’t going anywhere. We just sat, drunk off our asses in the parking lot of a strip club in Baltimore.
I was nineteen, and it was just another Saturday night. Don was my best friend at the time, and that summer we were inseparable. Then he did something unexpected. He pulled out a piece of cardboard and plopped a line of cocaine down on it.
“Want some?”
Poverty
Merriam Webster defines poverty as “the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions.”
Regular readers know I was born and raised in Baltimore City. I can’t say I grew up in poverty, my family was solidly lower-middle class. My Dad was a printing press mechanic, a decent blue collar job that earned enough to raise a small family, but not enough to get us out of the city.
But I was surrounded by lots of poverty, and grew accustomed to it. As an observant teenager I learned quickly about the “cycle of poverty”, because I witnessed examples of it every day.
The Wikipedia page for the cycle of poverty describes it as:
“the set of factors or events by which poverty, once started, is likely to continue unless there is outside intervention”.
The cycle feeds on itself. It builds momentum that’s incredibly hard to stop.
Fueled by the legacy of destructive habits and situational bad cards, the cycle is a force to be reckoned with.
Societal Bubbles
We hear a lot about ‘social media bubbles’ these days. Information across the board is more readily accessible than ever, yet many or perhaps most people seem to only consume information that adheres to their preconceived viewpoints, on whatever given topic.
But society as a whole is really just a set of bubbles. People form friendships and alliances based on any number of societal factors. And in the end the natural tendency of humans is to form similar peer groups.
The academic term for this is “homophily”. The research on behavior within homophilies is fascinating. Take this study for instance which finds:
A person’s chances of becoming obese increased by 57% (95% confidence interval) if he or she had a friend who became obese in a given interval. Among pairs of adult siblings, if one sibling became obese, the chance that the other would become obese increased by 40% (95% CI). If one spouse became obese, the likelihood that the other spouse would become obese increased by 37% (95% CI).
These phenomena are similar for smoking, or any number of behaviors.
And it’s true for poverty too.
Once a certain number of your friends develop destructive and dangerous habits that lead to poverty, you will likely too. The cycle of poverty is in the end a societal bubble than can’t break free of itself.
And if Hillbilly Elegy showed us anything, it’s that intergenerational poverty is something that’s colorblind.
The Line
I attribute the fact that I am where I am today to knowing where the line was. What is “the line”?
Grammarist describes the term, or more accurately crossing it, as:
To cross the line means to overstep a boundary, to go beyond socially accepted behavior. When one crosses the line, one goes from being acceptable to being unacceptable.
By that definition I crossed the line routinely in my youth, many of us did. Besides, depending on which bubble we spend most of our time the definition of “socially acceptable behavior” is likely quite different, with wildly divergent boundaries.
But that’s what bubbles are all about in the first place, right?
You may be a wealthy accountant with a cookie cutter house in the suburbs and a successful and innocuous life. But your carbon-copy neighbor who you curiously don’t talk to much might be all of those things too, and also president of a swingers club.
Could that be why you two don’t socialize? You may appear the same, but you’re really in different bubbles, with different views on socially acceptable behavior.
In my youth I was able to form an ultimately life saving understanding of the line from my parents and from people in other bubbles. Bubbles that were higher on the socio-economic scale than mine.
In other words, permeable bubbles were my saving grace.
I was able to let a few others inside my bubble, and others did the same for me. By seeing how just a few people from other bubbles – better bubbles – conducted themselves and their lives, it moved my understanding of the line.
Not by much, but just enough.
I wasn’t really aware of this at the time in a direct or practical way. If you would have asked me if any one misdeed was “over the line” at the time I probably wouldn’t have been able to tell you.
But if it came to a decision point to act out that deed or not, in the heat of the moment, I inherently knew. I called upon things I saw from those outside my bubble.
The Decision
I stared at the cocaine, flustered, head spinning. I instantly knew what it was, but this was the first time I had actually seen any up close.
A wave flushed through my body, as if I had an internal fire alarm and someone or something broke the glass and pulled the handle.
This was a key moment in my life. It was a line.
It was the line.
“No man, no thanks”
I tell this story because had I not made that wise decision, I doubt I’d be where I am today.
Don and I were both spiraling down rapidly, struggling with family demons and things in our past. Surrounded by a city full of vices to feed that spiral, our futures were dark.
We were walking on a ledge. A fall on one side assured a challenging life in a bubble of depravity, or maybe worse. A fall on the other was towards a bubble of hope, and a chance.
Don fell to the former. I wavered back and forth, unbalanced, but eventually fell the other way.
Part fall, part choice.
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Man, generational poverty and the choices (or lack there of) that brings is tough. This is something I care deeply about in my personal life and spend a ton of time teaching other attending physicians who have never experienced what that is like.
Everyone has their own narrative, but sometimes escaping the one that feels like it was written just for you is tough. Particularly when you see it happening to everyone around you.
I am glad that it turned out the way that it did for you, Dave. Keep spreading the word about the difficult situation that this all brings. It’s certainly part systematic/systemic and part-personal. It’s rarely one or the other.
TPP
Believe me I’m glad it turned out the way it did too. It actually felt good to write that story as I’ve rarely told it. Thanks for the comment!
Brilliant concept of societal bubbles. You are correct that we tend to gravitate/socialize with people that are of similar social stature.
In India there is the caste system and whatever caste you are born into is pretty much where your place/standing in society will be. Very rare to move out of your particular caste unless by some chance you marry into a higher caste (rare but can happen).
In America thankfully you are not defined by your birth but what you make of it. Although I would be foolish to think that someone born into privilege does not have a leg up on someone who doesn’t. But at least if you have some creative ability or talent or level of intelligence you can be recognized and shoot your way up to higher class levels based on your own work and not because of birthright.
Glad you made some smart choices along the way and the life you live now is a direct result of it. It’s almost like one of those books where you choose your own path to find out the ending. Who knows what diversion your path would have taken had you chosen to accept trying that line. I for one am glad you didnt
Nat Geo has done numerous big articles on the Indian caste system… it’s horrendous. The whole field of Sociology fascinates me more as I get older.
Thanks for the kind words!
Pretty good analysis. The whole bubble thing is tough for me. I know I’m more comfortable around certain people. But I’m not comfortable around a lot more.
Hopefully, our son will be able to socialize with more bubbles.
Good job saying no to that one.
Thanks Joe. I think kids today have the opportunity to get outside their bubble more and more with technology – or not. As social media shows it WILL allow you to get outside of it, but only if you choose.
What a great article, Dave. I’ve never thought of societal bubbles. Your parents gave you the foundation to allow you to view outside your bubble. I wonder if Don had the same grounding. I love the concept of letting others inside your bubble and having others allow you in theirs. Peering into a bubble “higher” than yours moved the needle Great stuff, man.
BTW, I had the same choice as you did in the car that day. Unfortunately, i went the other way. I wasted years of my life as a result. It was a different era (the seventies). However, in your neighborhood, I’m not sure the era mattered. Glad you made the right choice. Glad you’re where you are. Glad you’re willing to share your story.
Keep up the great work. I’m going to put this post into the poverty finance sub Reddit today. I think it will resonate with a lot of folks.
Thanks for the kind words Fred and for the Reddit post. Sorry to hear of your story but you definitely righted the ship!
you might find this hard to believe, but i made the same choice you did. i drew that line at being a drinker, probably due to the fear of my prison guard dad. you read my poverty post i think and it was so much more than a quantifiable number. i grew up in a rural coke town and a lot of my high school classmates ended up in federal prison when that ring got busted up. they were nice enough to do their best to keep me and a couple of friends away from all that life. before that i always wondered how some of these knuckleheads were with the nicest looking girls. i asked an old friend once and he said “it’s because i had the drugs” in a matter of fact way.
great job dude! we chose correctly, but that was hard wasn’t it? Same experience with me, I saw the dudes who were going further and further across the line getting all the girls, and that peer pressure can be intense. glad we both made it through!
Wow what a story, and a great way to relate that to the societal bubbles we all live in. I’ve never quite experienced anything like that in the solidly middle class suburbia I grew up in, but I was raised in a way to recognize the bubbles that weren’t ideal and would lead down a tough path. I credit my parents for helping me to realize this and once I knew, it was easier to say no to the actions and people that I knew wouldn’t lead to a good outcome. Great way of telling your story!
Thanks man, appreciate the kudos!
Darn mate, you really did have a rough youth! Does show will power to say no and ultimately go into the right direction! Impressive, most people won’t be able to pull that off. Any idea how your buddy Don ended up?
Talking about those bubble, it’s hard to get out some times. It does feel safe in such an environment. But it is crucial to cross that line and experience other opinions and ideas. You might learn something or understand others better.
It’s funny, I can’t honestly say it was ‘rough’, especially at the time. Had you seen me on any given night back in those days I was always laughing (and drinking), and having fun (and drinking). At the time I thought it was the glory days, but I saw the darker side years later.
As far as Don, last I had heard he was working at as gas station in East Baltimore. He’s a really smart dude, and I hope he’s doing okay
It’s amazing how one choice can set a new course for your life! I was listening to an interview with Lady Gaga about A Star is Born and she said, “there will be 1,000 people who won’t believe in you…but it just takes that one person to believe in you.” Ultimately about the story line of the movie, but also with Bradley Cooper casting her in that role. Yes, you should believe in yourself, but sometimes there is one situation or person that can pull you over the line too. I feel, and not sure if you do, that there is a hidden universe out there with you in it but with a totally different life…sometimes worse, sometimes better. It’s interesting to visualize that as a movie. But your life is the way it is now, all because of a million little choices.
Yep, sometimes it’s just one choice indeed. If you get one DWI, the criminal record could change your entire career or what jobs you can get. Or of course you could die or get someone else killed. Thanks for the comment!
I see a parallel with your rock climbing, with you on the ledge, very close to a fall. Maybe triumphing over this situation and breaking out of that bubble, it gave you the courage to rise to new heights. It is amazing to look back and realize how one decision could have taken your entire life on a different path. So glad you recognized the line and walked the line, so to speak.
Great observation as always, lots of parallels to climbing. You’ve got to choose each hand hold very carefully, the wrong one can be very bad sometimes!
That is one hell of a story and feeds into the strong emotions I am having in regards to the homelessness epidemic that is bubbling over in our communities here. I can’t stand the hate and privileged attitude that the haves cast down upon the homeless who have begun to rally and fight back to try and save their lives. Your story speaks to how lack of support and one mis-step across that line or bad misfortune can spiral out of control. We need to create those permeable bubbles and allow others to enter so we can help them live better lives, ones that might just literally save their lives.
Thanks so much Chris. Yeah it’s hard to cross those ‘bubble lines’. I honestly think it’s easier when you’re younger since you likely don’t have such strongly-formed opinions from life experience. The richer kids I was exposed to were from my neighbor, who went to a high school way out in the county. Their families had swimming pools and they went on vacations on airplanes. It was a bizarre world to me, but I emulated enough of their behavior to nudge me the right way.
Well we are fortunate to have your life experiences that have eventually become formulated into blog posts like this.
Gracias dude, I really appreciate that!
Man, intense. Makes you realize how blessed we are to have been outside of this stuff. And it makes you realize how there are social decisions that make a huge difference later, but at the moment don’t seem to be much.
Btw, was it Night Shift????
So your comment caught me off guard until I realized that we talked about B-more in Orlando and that you know the city well. Yes, it actually was. I grew up on the east side of the City and that place was an institution, even back in the 80’s.
Wow, that’s quite a moment to experience. I had to turn down cocaine before too, which is about when I realized that I was hanging out with the wrong crowd of people. They were going to keep making poor choices (including financially) and it was especially frustrating since I was unable to work due to a disability. I was being careful with my money while watching them fritter theirs away on drinking and the occasional drugs. Like you, it made me realize that I had some tough choices to make. Ultimately, I found a healthier set of friends who were more money-savvy and drug-averse.
As those studies I linked to show, hanging out with the wrong crowd has a high likelihood of being detrimental. Glad you found a better crowd to be with!
I’m glad you were able to fall the right way off the ledge, and it’s scary how close you might have been to falling the other way. When things are going well, it’s easy to forget that there are many people trapped in painful cycles, and it’d be great if there were less judgment and more efforts to help people break out.
Thanks. It’s easy to victim-blame those who are in poverty and really bad cycles but it’s not that simple. Many are born with no hope, no role models, no parents. For others all it takes is one bad decision,
Amazingly written! We all need to see beyond our bubbles so we can make the choice to accept or reject what is in our bubble.
Thanks for the kind words!
So well written and true. I, like you, sometimes traversed bubbles. I think I was right on the edge sometimes too and was glad to have sense to pull back.
Thanks and cheers, here’s to us bubble-traversing bloggers! 🙂
Interesting concept to consider bubbles of societal norms of acceptable behavior. And it’s fascinating how these bubbles overlap. Sometimes oddly. I’m sure there were many kids in the upper middle class bubble who were also in the cocaine bubble too.
As a kid, my parents were pretty involved in my upbringing and I grew up in a middle class to upper middle class neighborhood. It was a definitely a sheltered kind of bubble that tried to steer me away from falling off the edge. If I didn’t have that protective bubble, who knows.. maybe I would have fell.
Smart folks like you would have likely ended up a Doctor anyway, you might have just had a more difficult road to get there 😉
Great information man. This story reminded me of something I read in Cheryl Strayed’s book, TIny Beautiful Things, which recapped some stories from her Dear Sugar podcast. In response to someone who was dealing with the aftermath of choosing one relationship over another, she responded:
“Every life has a sister ship, one that follows quite another route than the one we end up taking. We want it to be otherwise, but it cannot be: the people we might have been live a different, phantom life than the people we are. And so the question is, who do you intend to be? You will see that there will be no clarity, at least in the outset; there will be only the choice you make and the sure knowledge that either one will contain some loss. I’ll never know, and neither will you of the life you don’t choose. We’ll only know that whatever that sister life was, it was important and beautiful and not ours. It was the ghost ship that didn’t carry us. There’s nothing to do but salute it from the shore.”
In this case I guess that other life may not have been so beautiful, but it is an interesting message to reflect on from time to time. It’s interesting how the bubbles work and how your perception of the world can change once you take a step back and become a little more self aware. The last few years I have felt more and more like Neo in the Matrix haha. I love my friends and my family, but most people are who they are and are not interested in putting in the work required for continuous self improvement. I need to find more of a local tribe when it comes to minimalism and personal finance. Don’t get me wrong, I still love a good football Sunday with my friends, but there is also much more to life and I never want to stop exploring, learning, and growing.
Wow, thanks for the awesome comment Mike! I, like many I assume, have often thought what would have happened in my sister life, if I had made different choices. It’s a crazy way to think but probably only human nature.
I also need more of an “outdoor tribe” at this point in my life. I have lots of cycling buddies, and some climbing buddies, but we’re spread all over the place and so many of those dudes have kids and 50-hr a week jobs etc. I get it, life and all. But it would be nice to have a closer-knit group that I can get out on adventures with.
Keep exploring dude, I know I will!
This is a great post packed with good information.
“Fueled by the legacy of destructive habits and situational bad cards, the cycle is a force to be reckoned with.”
So a homeless man was outside of my office for several months. At least six. He and I struck up a friendship and I’d bring him any extra stuff I got on business trips like soap and shampoo or a back pack or coffee thermos from a conference.
He was trying really hard to get his documents in order. Long story.
Anyway, he disappeared for maybe two to three months. I figured he finally got a construction job and had moved on. He had.
But I ran into him earlier this week. It seems that the person who hired him was writing him personal checks while claiming that he was withholding taxes for Virginia and California. Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense. And he was not being given a pay stub either. So he was rightly concerned he was getting screwed and going to get screwed at tax time. Back to the street he goes. He did everything right. Got a job. But got taken advantage of and is back where he started. Sucks.
Man…. that’s horrible. People will kick you when you’re down, that story shows one of the many ways. It’s gotta be so hard to dig out of that, to get that one break that doesn’t have strings attached or that isn’t a scam. I certainly hope he can find an honest employer.
Thanks for the kind words man!
Amazing post, my friend. Surely this is Rockstar worthy. Where to begin. I’ve been thinking a lot about generational poverty lately as well. I love your bubble analogy and the idea of permeable bubbles is very encouraging. After all, bubbles or cultures are free. There’s no cost to dropping a lame bubble for a kick-ass bubble. In a future post, I’m going to be looking at generational poverty through the lens of the “broken-windows” theory. And I think your “bubble” theory will help make my ideas more persuasive. Thank you, sir. Reading this post was a great way to end the week. Cheers.
P.S. I had my “crossing-the-line” moment with marijuana in 8th grade. Took a pass on it and never regretted the decision. I also had a “crossing-the-line” moment with strip clubs in my early 20s. I don’t know why, but all of a sudden it hit me that strip clubs were demeaning to both employees and patrons. Haven’t been in a strip club in decades–and again, no regrets.
I appreciate the kind words Groovester! This was definitely a meaningful post for me and I know I’m not alone in having stories like this, as your comment attests. Glad I could give you some thoughts for your post, awesome bloggers like you and so many others do the same for me!
Wow what a great story and lesson. Generational poverty and class is a real thing. My parents were also lower middle class and my siblings and I struggle just to break into the middle middle class. Of the 3 of us, I’m the only one who managed to break through. It’s a tough cycle to break.
Congrats to you and thanks for stopping by!
Yes I agree, this is so true. On a smaller scale there is the saying ‘you’re the sum of the 5 people you hang out with the most’. I’ve found this to be hugely true in the past year. I think we tend to naturally seek to be around people who confirm our beliefs and validate our decisions. It pays to be purposeful about this. 🙂
“Purposeful” is a great word to describe it and I’d also add that you have to re-evaluate at certain points in your life as well.
What a powerful post! I grew up in a lower middle class family and it was going off to college (which was more affordable back then) that introduced me to new bubbles. That completely changed the trajectory of my life. I can see how the cycle of poverty perpetuates itself and how bubbles can play a critical role in that. Part fall, part choice indeed.
Thanks Gary!
I very much enjoyed this. It makes me appreciate the lifestyle my family was able to provide for me. Good for you for walking away from that choice.
Thanks!
I sometimes think about how different my life would be right now if I hadn’t made certain decisions in life: if I’d gone to a different college, or moved out of DC after graduating, or if I hadn’t decided to start learning about how money works. But those were all decisions made in the secure, middle/upper middle class bubble I’ve been in my whole life. Thanks for giving me things to think about today!
I think we all contemplate roads untraveled sometimes but when it happens I try to focus those thoughts on where I’m at now, and making that situation better. But the mind will explore…
I’m glad you liked it Erin, thanks for the kudos!
I am glad you didn’t cross the line.
Indeed your story makes me think how many times we are so close to moments that can change radically our lives for better or for the catastrophe….
Thanks. Most of us have had those moments indeed, and it makes you wonder how much life can change for some in the blink of an eye.
Nice choice and example of “the line”. This makes a lot of sense. I was so different than my peer group and chose a radically different path even though we all were in the same school and neighborhood. I joined the Airforce and a bunch of them broke those lines into repeating their families history. My choices alienated me at first which was not comfortable, but over time I developed my own bubble of peers and we are all happy in our own definite social norms.
Not saying success is defined by cash, but when I look back at my old friends I realize the oppertunities I have now because of my good descisions and the people I socialize with. The contrast is huge.
The Air Force no doubt gave you tons of discipline and it’s obviously done you well. THANKS for your service!
This was always taught to me in the form of: “You are the average of the five people you connect with the most.”
I agree!