On Black Friday, I spent $106 in an hour. I spent more money in 60 minutes than some people see in a month, the morning after eating a meal that could have fed an Ethiopian village.

Sure, I feel bad--I’m a wasteful, decadent person. But I don’t feel anywhere near as awful as some of the people who will read this.

There are people in our town, in our school, who didn’t eat a ten pound turkey on Thanksgiving and won’t eat a ham on Christmas. There are people in our school who may not get presents for the holidays, and we all know this.

Yet December seems to be the only month in which our society opens its eyes to the poverty within it. When we see the colossal gap between the $347.44 (the average spent on Black Friday) and the zero that some spent, we recoil in fear from that abyss and run to our nearest bell ringer.

The majority of charitable donations are made during the winter as people react to the holiday season and the end of the tax year. But after January first, the poor do not fade away with their Angel Tree presents in hand; we simply put on blinders to their plight.

Our society has adopted a see no poor, hear no poor philosophy, sweeping those who have failed to achieve the American dream into cramped apartments and government housing.

Ignoring the poor won’t make them go away, nor will handing them a few presents every December.

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t buy a few kids some boots this winter, but come June, maybe we could buy them some sandals too.