photos by Aimee Dilger | article and video by Kelly Dessoye
Joe flung open his ornament speckled door. There was something he needed to get off his chest.
Every Wednesday for the last 7 years, Joe and his husband David lumbered across the back parking lot of the Daniel Flood Tower Apartments, crossing the street to the Church of Christ Uniting, his tattooed arms clinging to a walker to support his hulking frame. Once there they’d stock up on fresh fruits and veggies for the week. Joe, a gourmand and type 1 diabetic, would chomp at the bit to whip up spaghetti squash and eggplant from the pantry - nourishing himself and “my husband”, as he takes every opportunity to call David.
“We’re like two peas in a pod,” Joe muses as David nods - a loving affirmation of a relationship that’s spanned 22 years and counting. “When I saw him on the Dateline service and we met up, I knew he was the one.”
Joe and David share an apartment in the Daniel Flood Tower Apartments (locally known as Dan Flood) - 210 subsidized units packed into a 16 story brick facade looming over Wyoming Avenue in Kingston, PA.
Every square inch of their one bedroom unit is a time capsule of their years together. Jesus, angels, owls, friends, and family look over the couple from gold gilt picture frames - a wooden grandfather clock chimes faithfully every half hour. Their home is warm. Loving.
There are the good times, like their wedding day in 2014, when a friend serenaded the couple to Ave Maria and gifted them the Christmas ornament tacked on a stucco wall. Then there are the years David battled Leukemia, Joe proudly recounting how he shaved his head right to the scalp. “If my other half had no hair, I wanted no hair. I support my other half in everything,” his bushy whiskers bouncing as he recounts the memories.
Now they’re up against another battle -
the closure of the Al Beech West Side Food Pantry at The Church of Christ Uniting (COCU) - a major artery of the food supply chain for people in Kingston, including those living at Dan Flood.
Like many of the residents there, David and Joe don’t have cars. They’re also both over 50 and on disability; pulling in a total of under $1300 a month before rent and expenses.
“Most other counties, like Wilkes-Barre,” the neighboring city, “ have food pantries, but Kingston, you barely see that,” Joe’s voice raises in frustration as he notes that the nearest pantry - Sara’s Table at Kraus Chaiken Food Pantry, part of the local JCC - is almost a mile away. *
Dan Flood’s bulletin board posts a list of local pantries, their addresses, and phone numbers, but the information is outdated. A drive by the Wyoming Valley AIDS Clinic - a pantry listed on the bulletin board- proved fruitless as the clinic moved to Wilkes Barre. Where residents of Dan Flood don’t pay for water, electricity, gas, or garbage they do need to pay for a landline phone, internet, and cable, making it all the harder for a person to search for resources when they’re already pinching pennies.
According to Dan Flood property manager Kerri Zurcher, CEO Weinberg Food Bank drops off monthly produce boxes and all residents are eligible to apply. Sarah’s Table at the Kingston JCC also offers a proxy service, where a representative of an individual can act as a “proxy” and pick up food from their pantry after filling out a form and providing valid proof of ID for each member of a household. It’s not clear whether Joe and David use these services.
The couple have qualified for an assisted living specialist for a combined total of 20 hours a week, who helps them run errands - including to the grocery store - the nearest of which is about half a mile away - but their meager income is no match for COVID-19 fueled inflation.
According to the USDA’s October 2021 CPI Forecast, the cost of fresh fruits and vegetables has been rising all year and rose another .7% from August-September 2021.
“We used to get tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage, fresh milk, ground beef...healthy stuff,” Joe reminisces. He tears open cupboards filled with pasta, cereal, peanut butter, and other shelf stable goods, brandishing a frozen TV dinner. “You have to eat what you have to eat,” he laments. It's a stark contrast to the seasonal produce he was hauling home just 6 weeks ago, and when he can’t keep tabs on his sodium intake, Joe’s various medical issues flare up. “Since I’m not eating the right type of food, I’m filling up with fluid.”
Al Beech’s walk-in produce stand was a lifeline for them.
The walk-in produce stand was the brain-child of Rena Briggs - a longtime volunteer of Al Beech. “They used to just have everything in boxes,” she says on an overcast afternoon. She thought it would be a better idea to lay out boxed items on a table in COCU’s auditorium, creating an experience akin to shopping in a grocery store rather than receiving hand-outs from the charitable food system.
Once COVID hit and Al Beech became a drive-thru operation, people like Joe and David were still able to walk to COCU’s parking lot to pick up bags of produce, milk, cheese, eggs, and meat without further risking exposure to COVID-19.
Now she’s concerned about pantry guests like Joe and David, some of whom she’s kept up with. “They have no way to get there - to get food. They’re asking me questions - ‘Is it going to open? What’s going to happen? What’s going on?’”
“That place helped a lot of people out. It did. It helped a lot of people out. They were grateful. They were coming faithfully every Wednesday. They depend on it.”
Pam Karalunus, an Al Beech volunteer for over 3 years, worries about the large population of elderly individuals who would come to the pantry weekly. “We have to get them the assistance but we have to do it with dignity because it takes a lot for them to ask for help in the first place [so] they need to feel they are welcome.”
“It’s their time out...They were excited. The women would get all dressed, they’d put their earrings on, they’d make sure their lipstick was on, and they’d come out. They’d see their friends. It’s more than just giving them something to eat. It was giving them nourishment for their soul as well as their body. And they don’t have anything now. These folks were just left high and dry. I don’t think it needs to end this way. I don’t think the Al Beech West Side Food Pantry has to stop.”
As of publication, COCU has remained tight-lipped on the subject of the Al Beech West Side Food Pantry and several email requests to a representative of the pantry haven’t been answered, however their website states that the pantry is “closed until further notice.”
“It’s hard but we’re taking this day by day.”
Their black and white spotted cat teeters about and Joe leans forward on a plush couch,
“I wish somebody could straighten this out, and please re-open again. People need help with food.”
Kingston and Wilkes-Barre are both in Luzerne County in Pennsylvania.*