OPINION
Children are strange creatures sometimes.
Growing up in a small beach town, kids my age showed bravado by walking to school in bare feet and wearing shorts through winter.
It was something to boast about – "I don't feel the cold, I can wear a t-shirt all year."
"I went for a swim at the beach on the weekend, it was so cold I could barely walk afterwards."
"I can walk on the road in bare feet, I don't even feel the stones."
This little wuss, though, always felt the cold. I would walk to the bus stop in my sneakers then, as I drew close, hide them in my school bag so I too could display a patina of toughness.
But, sometimes, children's silliness can be a cover for something deeper. It's easier to make a game of a bad situation than to face the harsh reality of your life.
When I was 11 or so, my class was rehearsing daily for some major event. What exactly, I can't remember. But every day we were in the school hall practising our kapa haka and learning songs by heart.
After one practice, our teacher sat us down to explain to us how the big event would play out. "No talking, no visible jewellery, and wear your school track pants so you're all matching."
Soon after, one of the aforementioned "tough" kids, a tall, pretty girl who wore shorts year-round, quietly approached me at morning tea time. She asked if she could borrow a pair of track pants from me as she didn't have any.
She was so embarrassed she could barely make eye contact.
I still remember the confused mixture of emotions that battled within me at this statement; a sickly combination of pity, shock, acute consciousness and disillusion.
Not wanting to make a big deal and shame her more, I acted (or tried to) as if her request was nothing out of the ordinary and said "sure, I'll bring some tomorrow". And I did.
I never got those track pants back, by the way. But that girl quietly stopped boasting about how tough she was.
My sneakers remained on from that day forward, and my feet were grateful for their warmth.
It makes me wonder how many of the so-called tough kids from my childhood were truly the bold surfer types they portrayed, and how many were actually putting a brave face on their family's struggles.
Maybe their parents, too, were boastful: "I can feed a family of four with $50 a week, I don't know how some people spend hundreds of dollars on groceries."
"I'd rather buy frozen veges than fresh, they're so much easier to cook."
"I want my kids to know what hard work is, you know? I want to set a good example for them, so I've taken on a second job in the evenings. My 13-year-old is learning how to cook meals for the family, they're going to be a hard worker too."
Bravado.
Or, maybe, their parents were sitting on the pokies, or inhaling fumes from a pipe, or drinking away their grocery money.
At the end of the day, the "why" doesn't really matter, does it? Those kids were still going to school cold, and maybe hungry too.
Whether their parents were doing their absolute best for their children or completely neglecting them, their children were still going without through no fault of their own.
And my experience was 20-odd years ago. We've been through a recession, a housing crisis and a pandemic since then. Maybe it's just my perception, but things feel a lot harder now than they did then.
Children are sleeping in tents, garages and cars because their parents can't find homes.
Their education is suffering because housing instability means relocating from place to place, affecting attendance and resulting in frequent changes of school. Disrupted education means fewer opportunities in adulthood.
Childcare costs are often astronomical, either taking a huge portion of a family's budget or forcing a parent to stay at home and forfeit their wage-earning ability.
Or, like the heart-breaking story that surfaced in Kaitaia this week, pre-schoolers are scavenging food from rubbish bags.
What kind of adults are impoverished children going to grow up to be?
If your life has consisted of scavenging for meals, using willpower alone to battle the cold, taking care of your younger siblings while your parents are at work or partying, what is your chance of graduating high school and getting a well-paying job?
"It's not the Government's responsibility to do a parent's job" is something I hear many people argue. But blaming parents doesn't fill a child's belly, nor does it ensure these children will improve on their parents' lot.
"Pull yourself up by your bootstraps" goes the old saying.
Hard to pull your bootstraps when you don't have shoes though, isn't it?