Angry Old Broad.
I've never been poor. My late husband was. His mother was widowed when he was 5, and in that era, women didn't prepare for careers because that's what husbands were for. He was raised in a barely scraping by, waiting tables and checkout girl job world. He always made light of it, and made it sound like sleeping in a windowless walk in closet as a bedroom was just a funny, quirky kid thing. Like not eating lunch. Like walking miles everywhere because they couldn't afford to buy a bicycle, let alone a car. Yeah, it was quirky. Romantic, right?
When we first got married we were on the edge, especially when the first kid showed up about three years ahead of "schedule." We adjusted, and ate a lot of pasta. A wild party night involved "spiced tea" homemade on the stovetop (what we called chai back in the 80s) and Yahtzee. We moved up from that on a combination of hard work and luck. Never discount luck. Smarter and more talented people than us didn't luck into the links that pushed us forward out of lower middle class into not quite upper middle class. We worked hard, but we also had some seriously lucky breaks where we made work connections that benefitted us for years.
Then he got sick and died, and if I hadn't made my own career connections and had my OWN lucky breaks that formed my own track record, I'd be fucked right now and typing this from the back bedroom of my parents' house and working a checkout counter at Publix, and just glad my parents were living to take me in. As it is, I was able to carry on, with a nice 1600 square foot house on a micro-lot that has appreciated beyond comprehension in the last couple of years, but virtually no savings, a shitload of debt, and a decent career. I count myself as one of the lucky ones.
I've never been poor - I've never had to choose between eating and feeding my kids. But I've seen how fast the abyss can swallow people who thought they had it all figured out. I've stood on the edge and looked over it, and was thankful that I had just enough on my side not to be dragged over the edge. Just barely enough. So I'll add to the Angry Old Broad's rant - there, but for the grace of luck and location, goes a bunch of Bush Worshippers. And they won't know the dragon is out there until it swallows their family whole. For the sake of their kids, at least, I hope they wake up.
To-tal-ly on target. I once had an argument with a friend whom I otherwise liked fine, who insisted that if you worked hard, you would become successful and well-to-do. I told him my father had worked hard as a foreman for PG&E (utility co) for 39 years and we never had any money. Working hard is a component, but luck/grace is as big a one, sometimes more. He had some comebacks, but I stand by it. Lots of people work harder than I do for less money and in more difficult circumstances; OTOH, if I lived almost anywhere else, I could probably buy a house. Some of that is luck of the draw. I really get incensed with the "pick yourself up by your bootstraps, be self-reliant, work hard, and you too will have the American Dream!" crap that emanates from the right.
ReplyDeleteI think the American Dream is about bettering yourself. Not staying in a minimum wage job working 60 hours a week and going nowhere. Yeh that's working hard alright.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was an 18 year old girl I found myself out on my own (1979)working 3 min wage jobs to surivive in a crappy apartment. But I thought about what should I do that would make me more money, I looked at successful people and followed what they did in life to better themselves. So I went to college at night, took me 8 years as I had to still work 50 or so hours a week, & took out loans. I graduated, became a CPA (as I saw that that was a job that paid well)
Then got my MBA, another 3 years of school, meant better pay. Was able to take loans for buying small properties and make money on real estate. Only in america could a starving 18 year old girl with nothing, become upper middle class with no help from anyone!
It's like Trump says, "you make your own luck"
This is not to anger anyone but to show that it is possible.
Valerie, I'm certainly not claiming it's not possible, I know many people who did it. My husband went from sleeping in a closet to traveling the world as a computer engineer for an international company. His first "break" was Vietnam, if you can call it that - the government gave him an education. It took me 15 years to finish a degree, working and raising two kids and with a husband on the road constantly, but I did it. But we have the grace to acknowledge the help we had along the way - the job connections made, the friends who recommended us, the boss who called my husband years after an earlier company had been bought out and downsized and hired him at his new company, etc. (During the early 90s, not a few engineers ended up running video rental stores.)
ReplyDeleteWe worked hard, but we also had breaks. We recognized them and were grateful for them. I know others who didn't get the same breaks. Working hard and having ambition are important components to success, but so is luck.
Valerie ~ I know it is possible, too, because I did it. I grew up on the fringe of the lower middle class, not dirt poor, but certainly learned how to keep up the appearance of having more than we actually had. I know what it's like to pinch the buck so hard you drink powdered milk because you can't afford the real thing.
ReplyDeleteBut there's another component to the "pull yourself up by the bootstrap" argument that often gets ignored: class. If our parents were members of the solid middle class, or upper class, but they somehow couldn't get out of the lower middle class or found themselves in a downward spiral, they still transmit those values that make bootstrapping possible: the importance of education being perhaps the greatest value passed from generation to generation.
I had breaks, I had luck. Yeah, I worked hard, too, but without the breaks, I wouldn't be where I am today.
But those stuck living below the poverty line are caught in a vicious circle where it is often impossible to catch a break. When you're caught in the cycle of just meeting today's needs, planning for tomorrow is a distant dream.
Kerstin
crazydaisy.us