Wake up at 6 am Monday through Friday to go scrapping. That is what the man does to bring in a living. He has a license unlike a lot of the scab scrappers that he must compete against. He drives through certain neighborhoods, takes any visible metals, and leaves the stuff as neat as when he came by. It drives him nuts to see the people who dig stuff out of trash bags or leave a mess or break glass all over lawns. He hates the way the scabs break into houses or steals the fencing from the roadsides. This is his job since he lost his to a medical condition he doesn't have insurance to treat.
He comes home after a couple of hours and helps with morning chores. He feeds the dogs and checks the property. He helps medicate the special needs child. He gets to work breaking down the scrap. The more you break it down into it's different metals the more you can earn. Now that winter is near there is wood to be split and a fire to tend over the course of the day.
The wife is homeschooling three kids. Two of them are special needs. She is trying to get all of the medical needs of the family met.She fills out that form, calls those people,pays that bill, puts off another and writes to these other folks. She juggles those chores with trying to earn a bit using the family computer, helping break down the scrap, and her own medical issues.
The family then loads up into the car to go to therapy 3 times a week totaling over 15 hours. Hubby has to drive because the wife has seizures. Wife handles the kid in therapy and the hubby watches over the other two kids. Then the other days of the week is the "other" appointments. There are doctors to see, tests to be run, groceries to fetch and scrap to turn in for gas and grocery money.
They get home just in time for Hubby to head out (Sunday through Thursday evenings) to do his scrap run. Wife and kids do the afternoon chores and play time. Play around their house is like therapy time. They do crafts for fine motor skills, play parachute or biking for gross motor, tell stories for social skills, and speech is practiced as often as possible. Wife makes dinner and hubby will do the dishes.
Nights are spent breaking down scrap and working in what ever way is needed. The kids are doing what ever they feel up to until story time. The chores every family has is worked into their day - showers and baths, diaper changes, and room cleaning. The same everyday stresses are there with the added stresses of medically fragile members of the family, bad moods, and bad physical days. There are money worries and days when parents don't eat so the kids can.
And it really gets rough when there is a need that needs to be met and no where to turn to get it. A breathing machine (nebulizer) breaks and the youngest can't breathe. A problem with the truck and there is no way to get money to feed the family. An extra bill or trip to the ER can turn the whole world upside down and side ways.
This is the reality being faced and balanced by many people (families) these days. Both of these parents had jobs 7 years ago. They made 75% more then they bring home now. Both are facing medical issues that aren't being addressed. Neither has a criminal record or cheat the system. The kids are relatively happy and are taken care of. This is their life.
People who say that the poor are just lazy have no idea what it's like. People who say there are plenty of jobs are clueless to the realities of today's world. People who don't understand where the "poor" (as a class) are coming from have simply never been there, done that. They must be made to see that they are not too far away from being here themselves.
The reason the OWS/ 99% movement has caught on is because too many folks are falling without a net. They looked for work and couldn't find any. They have lost a house, a car, and all the stuff they once took for granted. No matter what political or OWS view you hold, you have to understand that things can't keep going on as they have if we are going to "recover" our nation as a nation, our world as a world.
I have not seen any answers I would call THE ONE, but I am at least seeing people trying to come up with solutions. That is progress. Instead of stamping down on the efforts of those trying to make a difference, or those folks just trying to make it through the day, why not BE the change the world needs? I am personally sick of the hate and fighting when we should all be doing what we can for each other.
The sooner we get together and work together on practical, down to Earth solutions that work for everyone, the sooner we will once again be everything we claim to be as a people. There will always be rich and poor but the poor doesn't have to be THAT poor, the poor that wipes out hope and happiness.
BALANCE IN ALL THINGS. The family I talked about would be happy with enough. Not fancy, or even modern... just enough. Enough food, enough warmth, enough care. Why is that such a problem for people to wrap their minds around? What is enough? Enough food is when everyone goes to be having eaten dinner every night of the month. Enough is when we don't worry about leaving our children as orphans because we can't get the treatments to cure our illness. Enough is not a 6 month wait for a 3 year old's leg braces.
This came out as more of a rant then I intended but I guess if more of us spoke of what we know, what we see, then we wouldn't have fallen so far behind. Stand up and fight or you will fall.... and soon.
I wish our politicians had half your smarts dear lady. You have an uncanny ability to cut through all of the bullshit, the party lines, the rhetoric and see the truth. Within your truth lies the answer but too many are blind to the obvious. No one needs to go to bed hungry. There are answers. Make your political leaders stop the petty name calling and back-biting and address the problems with solutions. I would like to believe this is the goal of all the "occupy" movement.
ReplyDeleteThings were never suppose to be like this.. We appointed a government to oversee things.. not enforce stupid stuff or turn a blind eye to those in need.. but to "manage" our money while we worked.. somehow things took a different route.. Government became power and given rights and tasks that weren't intended for them to ever have... And now it's up to US (common folks) to come up with a plan to save ourselves. It was never suppose to be like this!
ReplyDeleteKids were never suppose to go hungry while our country sends millions of dollars to help other countries.. Our elderly was never suppose to have to choose between medication or food. They have worked their entire life thinking that when they retired, their money would come back to them when they needed it.. and now it's not there. I'm stuck in middle class but I do understand "poor" I have many friends who are beyond "poor" and I know that they work harder than those who are in the upper class.. their day never truly ends. Being poor isn't a result of lazy.. it's a result of bad management skills of those we trusted with our money. Who turn a blind eye to what's in front of them and reach out to help countries that wouldn't pull us out of a mud hole if we were drowning.
I hope there is a solution.. and I believe that if their is one.. it will be coming from common folks who lost everything except their hope... their hope to get it right in their lifetime. I pray for that! :)
Great piece, Tammy.. Sad but honest. I love that about your work. :) (((((hugs!)))))
I wrote it mad. I wrote it worried. I wrote it with out stopping. I should have done a bit of editing. I just read it through again... so much more I could say. I actually left out some things that might make a difference. I'll work on it....
ReplyDeleteThank you for your support. You know already that I value your thoughts.
You are right. We became a country to be better then we were. People came here for freedoms, for the chance to be more, to live knowing they can reach comfort if not riches. It got lost. Power was taken from the people it belonged to. It can NOT stay this way. We can't just keep thinking that if we change sides then they will listen to us.
ReplyDeletecouldn't of said it better myself
ReplyDeleteI bet we all have tales to tell if only people would understand how much we are all touched by this.
ReplyDelete