Focus On Poverty--The Oxley Family

The Toronto Red Star's *Social justice reporter*, Tanya Talaga, in her ongoing series about poverty in Toronto, reports on the Oxley family, a modern day richess to rags story that will pull on your heartstrings and leave you feeling empty inside:

Several years ago, Mary and Don Oxley were living the good life. They earned $100,000 a year between them and bought a modest house in Brampton.

Don became disabled from a severe sciatic nerve condition in 2004. The Oxleys, who have a 16-year-old son, experienced a rapid drop in income, relying on Mary's $38,000-a-year pay as an office sales support worker and Don's $1,000 monthly disability cheque.

Basically, their income was cut in half. At this point, the Oxley's survival instincts kicked in:

"It hasn't been the best of times," says Don, 48, sitting in their family room, his canes resting beside him.

"You just barely live," adds Mary, 44.

Horrible, simply horrible.

It gets progressively worse for this monetarily tortured family, life not only spat in their collective faces, but it also kneed them all in their groins:

The Oxleys can't afford either to rent or go to the movies. But Mary's line of credit is maxed out at $19,000 because of a used vehicle she bought. To make things easier for Don, at home all day, and to give the family a source of entertainment two years ago, she bought a large-screen plasma TV and made payments on it for two years.

"You have to have some entertainment for him," she says.

A man without an entertainment system is not a man, he is just a worthless corpse waiting for someone to shovel dirt on his entertainmentless body.

The $3,800 TV is now paid for. But they still have their monthly cable bill of $176, which includes the Internet, cell and home phone.

I had to read that sentence four times, as my vision was clouded with tears the first three times reading it.

An available Family Service representative was able to put everything into perspective for this poor family:

For many low-income earners, a widescreen TV is "essentially and fundamentally the only entertainment," says Peel Family Services' Triantafillou. "How sad is that? I don't doubt for a minute, if they had the means they'd find other entertainment."

Truer words have never been spoken.

The Oxley family is so poor that they have to have a big screen TV just to survive. If they had a choice, it's obvious that they would have never bought the damn thing. They are so poor that they cannot afford a deck of cards, or a board game, or even enough money to spend family time together. They are so desperate that they cannot afford a pair of shoes to go for small walks, or sit on the porch and talk--poverty made them get cell phones, high speed internet, a smoking habit, a big screen TV, a house and a $19000 used car.

I'm saddened and ashamed to say that this isn't the only family in Toronto that are living in squalor. There are tens of thousands of Oxleys out there. All of them poor, destitute, and poverty-stricken through no fault of their own. Some of them, possibly up to 12%, couldn't even afford a 46' big screen and had to settle for the miserably 42'.

What can we do to help? Simple: Send Fenris your money. Fenris helps those who can't help themselves without helping themselves through your help.