With a lifetime of moving in and out of Appalachia and forcing meals to go a little farther for a family of five, Megan Law Kunze, 33, of Crown City, Ohio, is no stranger to unpredictability.
The 35-week pregnant stay-at-home mother of three and wife for over a decade is deserted within three Dollar Generals — three minutes to the closest DG, and one available on each direction of Route 7 ranging from five to 15 miles. The two major cities in the area are both thirty minutes away, providing more than Crown City’s Dollar General, gas station, small dairy bar, and carry-out store.
Megan was in high school when the local DG first opened, and she remembers the store being a “big deal” as it became a hot spot for teenagers to walk to. Food deserts weren’t uncommon for Megan as she lived in even more deserted locations, but she admits that it does not get much easier over the years.
She became a traveler at the young age of six weeks old, that’s when her family left Crown City for a Wisconsin home. At that time food sources and gas stations were about an hour away, but that all changed once she turned four years old. By then family moved close to their previous Ohio home, in Proctorville, which led to another move to Minnesota where they stayed for five years. Although moving was difficult, especially since her mother had to rely on home cooked meals, they needed to find a good paying job and school opportunities for Megan’s father.
Traveling didn’t stop as a child though, and when she was married and 22, she traveled a bit with her husband Speedy. They moved between cities and small towns of Ohio, Virginia, and Huntington in West Virginia.
While experimenting through a “food journey,” Megan continues to find new ways to feed her ever-growing family: 11-year-old Jenna, 6-year-old Lyzzie, and 2-year-old Logan, as well as her husband and three cats. Speedy is the only one employed, as a delivery driver, and is the main source of support for the soon-to-be nine member family.
Growing up, her family didn’t always prioritize food. As a child, Megan had pneumonia and medical bills were taking all of her parent’s income. While the family sometimes had no food in the pantry, Megan’s parents would still not ask for help and instead continued to pray. One day after a doctor's appointment the family came home to boxes of groceries on the porch with a note that wrote, "We just had this on our heart that we needed to give this to you."
"My parents were very adamant about not telling people when we were struggling,” Megan explained. “It’s not easy when you don't know if you're gonna be able to buy the next meal, as it can get really scary at times, but somehow we've always managed."
During a transition of a new job, her husband wasn't able to go to the store. Megan didn’t realize she ran out of the milk and other groceries. Her panic was later resolved with a knock at the door and food on the porch.
"I broke down and cried because it was like nobody knew I needed it... but for whatever reason, somebody dropped it off for me,” Megan said about her experience of kind neighbors and the natural helping hand from Appalachians.
Grocery shopping is a constant rotation depending on the season, or as Megan explains it, “eating meals to exhaust.” Grilled meats and vegetables, spaghetti, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, tomato sandwiches, and tuna are regular meals, and it is always expected to have milk and eggs.
"If I don't have eggs and milk, it seems like everything falls apart real quick,” Megan explained. She said the fridge and pantry are rough during the winter, and produce is more accessible during summertime.
“Winter is the over-processed food, It's the pasta's. It's the convenience to have like, you know, 'what can I throw in for the kids?' I know it’s not the best food, but it’s the 'hurry up and feed them.' Tthat was my thought process,” Megan said. “I’ll buy the cheap stuff, buy the frozen dinner, or whatever it takes to just put it into the house."
When the family lived in Huntington with more grocery options, rent was even more expensive and they were more strapped with money to pay bills. Meals meant whatever would last the longest: the cheapest cuts of chicken, small bags of carrots and onions for a huge pot of soup and homemade batches of sweet tea to last for weeks. Once the family ran out of tiny packets of sugar, they would have unsweetened tea.
"We were stretched on pennies,” Megan said about her early years as a mom. “We lived like that for a long time.” This was also a time when Megan and Speedy shared fast food meals of roughly a $3 splurge.
Fast food quickly became less fast and no longer a dollar menu with multiple kids.
"It can cost us up to $40. We took the kids to Waffle House the other day as a treat and it still cost us $40. And that was two adults and one child having a full plate, and our youngest two sharing,” Megan said.
Since they only have one vehicle, the family must plan for their trips to Kroger or Walmart — while relying on DG for convenience. They find buying organic to be overpriced and limited.
"It's the same with chicken. ...I would rather not have meats that are all these antibiotics and chemicals or that are caged their whole life. I would rather have free range style, but where we buy so much of it, I don't feel like I can justify the cost." Megan said she dreams of eventually having a farm with animals and a garden of vegetables.
“The convenience is really, really sickening,” she said. "You're not cooking for yourself, you're not cooking good food. So you're eating all this processed junk that really just ends up hurting you in the long run."
Fast food was a reliable source during her first pregnancy and random cravings. She wanted salt, and KFC mashed potatoes and gravy were just one drive thru away. She knew it wasn’t right, and she kept telling her OB who told her it was fine as long as she is taking prenatal vitamins. Megan had her first born at 23 weeks when her blood pressure “had shot through the roof.”
“I knew I wasn't getting good nutrition but I couldn't advocate for myself,” she said. To her, it felt like everyone justified the convenience of fast food and fulfilling easy cravings.
Megan said she is very mindful of her money and careful about paying bills, but it has been a long journey. Diapers and milk have always come before bills, so occasionally a bill would be put off. This became stressful and the family would try to provide double the rent to make sure the power would still be on.
"I really put my faith in it, because like the Lord says that 'Let tomorrow take care of itself and that He can clothe the fields with these beautiful flowers to get burned up tomorrow,’” Megan said. "We never actually ended up not having diapers for a child, no matter how tight money was — they never went hungry. Somehow, someway, we would just happen to find change in the car, or we would find spare money that I'd forgotten about, you know, $2 or $3. That was all we needed to get whatever it was.”
While Megan knows she occasionally needs help, it doesn’t come without guilt. There’s a big debate in her mind to accept assistance from local churches or food pantries.
"It's kind of embarrassing to go to a food bank. You feel like you should be able to survive. You don't feel like you should be hurting, but you are hurting. ...I don't want to be judged, or you're judging yourself so bad that you don't want to show up. My thing was always like 'is there someone worse off than me?'," Megan asked herself.
Regarding negative stereotypes, Megan believes there are some bad people in all areas, but that it shouldn’t define one area — like the Appalachian region — when it comes to help or deserving respect. Sometimes she forgets about the negative stereotypes of the area, but then occasionally remembers an older couple from southern Ohio that told her about their time going to New York in the 70s and that people were surprised that they were wearing shoes.
“They just couldn’t believe it. Country folk with no shoes? Unbelievable.”
May 2022