Years ago, I read a profile about a man, in an impoverished part of the world which could be anywhere, who owned a shovel. Because he had a shovel, he became the guy to call, in his community, when anything needed digging: Post holes, drainage ditches, shallow graves, deep graves, garbage pits, dirt-floor basements. If anybody was too frail, too tired, too busy or too rich to dig their own hole, he got the job. His life was shaped by poverty in a poor place, and by owning one item of use: a shovel.