ThriftGreen

It starts with familiar scenes. Wood shacks and raggedy children, hard lives and poverty surrounded by mystic beauty.  Fathers travel deep into the earth, searching for coal. Mothers stand with vacant eyes looking at the places in the walls that used to feature their husbands. And children become parents because poverty and sorrow have taken and molded them into adults, too young and too hard. It seems like a throwback, a picture of a time in history where coal mining was the hardest.

But this story is not from the past or the present. This is the beginning of The Hunger Games, a futuristic novel set in the US. The States have been divided and unified to form 13 Districts. Each has a focal job. District 12, where the film begins, is set in Appalachia, centrally, West Virginia.

The Hunger Games is a mix between two histories: the gladiatorial battles in Rome and the oppressed coal miners. As the trilogy continues, there is an uprising against the tyranny of “The Capital.”  This is almost eerily similar to the stories of the coal wars. Through establishing a union and striking, change was able to take place. But to accomplish change came the deaths of many people and trust between the government and the people being destroyed.

The games themselves are done in gladiator styles. Children, essentially, kill other children in a game of survival and bloodlust. Throughout the film it is repeatedly mentioned that the games are a TV show and the purpose is to entertain and control the people. It provides both hope and fear, and within the movie, a powerful motif is offered: hope is more powerful than fear.

In the Hunger Games the past was pushed forward into a new future. And the history of the Appalachian people is not a dead history. It is alive and evolving and being retold through futuristic teen fiction. And the power and the drive that are ingrained through struggle were also shown. As Katniss’s eyes flashed, as she fought for her family, as she fought to win an impossible battle … in this we can see our own history. We can remember the fatherless children who were left with only stories of explosions and coal mining accidents. We can appreciate an ability to survive off what the land gives. We can be proud of who we are an who we can be. Suzanne Collins erected a memorial for the Appalachian people with her book. Now we have a new avenue to tell the stories of this people.

This is what I remember:

Chilly weather in South Carolina. Not knowing where to go. Laughing with Sarah and Linnea. Buying 1984 and To Kill A Mockingbird in a used bookstore.

Next came being lost. We had to get to that one thrift store where everything was cheap that was on that road that went past the bookstore. We ended up in a power plant’s parking lot. We called Sarah’s dad. I think he was under the house doing some rewireing. But eventually he answered, gave us directions in his deep, loud voice, and we found Goodwill Clearance.

Imagine the floor of your messiest friend’s room. Imagine the clothes that cover the floor. Imagine that a genie transported the clothes onto blue tables in a warehouse with a sign that said Goodwill Clearance.

It smelled of dust and hands and washed-but-not-clean. There was a mountain of shoes. You had to search dig through them to find the match.

We got a tub on wheels on our way in, and soon we were digging through piles of clothes. I had worn skinny jeans and a sweater with a tank top under it. We would pull out a shirt, pants, something, and try it on. Linnea and Sarah would give me the yes or no. I couldn’t decide for myself – there wasn’t a mirror. We found dresses and skirts; shirts and jeans; shorts for summer. We searched using touch and sight to find a gem in all that chaos.

At the end of the search, after going through table after table of no organization, we rolled our tubs to the front. They stuck them on a scale, weighed them, and we paid by the pound.

By the pound. For clothes. Like they were bananas or something.

Afterwards we washed everything and sorted through it all again. The dusty smell was gone. We sorted through our finds, created new outfits, and were, all-in-all, amazed.

Goodwill Clearance was more like dumpster diving than shopping. But it was one of those wonderful times with friends. We laughed and searched and discovered. We found lots of treasures that didn’t even make it at the regular Goodwill. But there were still tons of things that were worth more than $1.19 per pound.