FELTON — With the price of turkey rising, along with many other foods, it has upended holiday traditions for Chris Collins.
The 68-year-old Felton man and his partner traveled a few miles north to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner at Calvary Church in Dover.
“The price of turkey has gone up so much that we can’t afford to buy it ourselves,” Collins said, adding that her monthly visits to the Lake Forest Association of Churches food pantry in Harrington also helps.
“The prices of everything have gone up and we don’t have enough money so we can’t afford to buy them,” he added.
Collins said his partner receives a small food allowance from the federal government that covers about two weeks’ worth of groceries a month.
But “after that, money is tight, so it’s hard to buy other things,” he says.
“If you don’t eat, you go hungry. Hunger is bad. There are a lot of hungry people, and the government doesn’t help us.”
Collins said he and his partner “eat mostly white meat, chicken, vegetables, salads and drink juice.”
But “I don’t have the money to buy more, so I have to cut back a lot on my diet,” he says.
A 10-year U.S. Marine Corps veteran who works part-time believes there are “a lot of older people who are being forced to go back to work because they don’t have enough money to buy groceries.”
The cheaper foods they buy, he added, are “losing a lot of the nutrients and protein and adding more additives.”
“You have to watch what you eat and there’s a lot of junk food out there for kids. My granddaughter comes here too so I have to be really careful what she eats.”
