How I got here

I remember once asking my mother about her family, and the main legacy that she remembered was that they were all hard-working people. They were good at their jobs, but also quite constant in them, most people starting with one job and staying with it through retirement (generally working for the railroad, as far as I can tell).

On my father’s side, well, I think everyone is a good worker, but there has been a lot more innovation. My grandfather owned an electronics shop at one point, and did maintenance at a Joss house (it’s a temple for worship in various Chinese religions), and lots of other things that I can’t even begin to tell you. This was probably due to a combination of hard economic times and some restlessness. This approach is not great for accumulating wealth, but you learn to do a lot of different things, and it takes some capability to pull off.

Nature or nurture, my siblings and I are all good workers. We do good jobs, and we started working early. I started at McDonald’s at 16, but had earned money baby-sitting, pet-sitting, berry picking, doing yard work, and keeping score at athletic events before that, and it was kind of the same for all of us. Because we worked, we got paid and we had money, and that was cool. It brought a certain independence and confidence with it. Unfortunately, we did not have good money-management skills.

I have mentioned this somewhere before, but books about teaching your children about money will say to make them save half. That always sounded so excessive to me, but I finally get it. When you have no living expenses, it makes sense to take out a large chunk like that. Then, when most of your income is being pulled away on rent and groceries and utilities, you have developed the habit of being responsible with the disposable income. You learned it when everything was disposable income. I did not learn that.

My father was pretty free-spending. It used to be that every time he opened his mail, he would say “Dear Deadbeat” aloud, and kind of trail off. I assumed it was a joke. When he would bring home shiny new gadgets, or take us on vacations, it never occurred to me that this was stuff we could not, or at least should not, afford. Instant gratification seemed to be the norm.

I did a lot of things right. I did graduate from college, paying for it myself. I worked steadily, always being a good employee. I used my earnings to help my family and give to charity, just like you should. However, I did rely too much on credit.

First of all, I used my credit cards for purchases without thinking about it, because I could always afford my payments, and there were different rewards programs, and it was convenient to just put it on the card instead of carrying around cash. But it added up, and many of those purchases were unnecessary and not even really that wanted. How many figurines does anyone really need?

Also, there were unplanned necessities. I didn’t expect to charge a new roof and furnace, but we needed them, we didn’t have savings, and I wanted to help. I did start a savings account, but the hole was already being dug. The other thing that it took me a while to catch on to was that the cost of living was going up, and my pay wasn’t.

I should have known better. The prophets were always counseling to avoid debt, and I would hear that and think, yeah, but I’m okay. I was wrong. Of course, the advantage of having prophets is that they will tell you things before the reason becomes obvious, at which point getting in line is much harder.

Buying the house from Mom was supposed to help, because we would use some of the money for repairs, and some for her retirement, and some to pay off my credit cards. Then the repairs took more than we planned on, and I didn’t want to short her retirement, so I left the balances on the credit cards, which were still manageable. And then I lost my job.

Now, if you are in the mood to condemn, you can certainly say that my actions were wrong here. Julie was going to go on her sabbatical to Australia. She was going to go with a friend, but things weren’t working out, and she asked me to go, and Maria and I both decided to go. We made plans and bought tickets and I asked my supervisor how to arrange for unpaid non-medical leave, since I did not have enough vacation time to cover the entire trip.

I had accommodated every time-off request I ever got, some of which were pretty ridiculous. Maybe I shouldn’t even have asked, but just remotely filled out my time card with 0 hours and come back. Anyway, I could not get a straight answer. Weeks went by with no response, and I would call and they would say “We are still looking into that.” Finally, three days before I was going to be leaving, I called again, and they said no, I couldn’t go. It turns out what they were really investigating was not what I needed to do, but whether they were legally obligated to let me go. I guess I asked the wrong question.

All this time I had been frantically working to make sure everything I ever did was documented, and that other people knew how to do it, and suddenly it became a lot more frantic. My manager thanked me for being so professional about everything, and said to call when I got back and maybe I could reapply for the job. I thought the purpose of that was so they could make me take a pay cut, but that I would still have the job. Instead they launched a search for a replacement. I was already back when she started training, so they did not save any time and they lost a lot of experience, as well as chucking morale for the team, apparently largely because I had hurt their egos by going anyway, but you know, as long as they made a good decision.

Was my decision good? At the time it felt like the only decision. A lot of what we paid was non-refundable, it would have ruined Julie’s sabbatical, and I wanted to go. It was a great trip. I loved it. I just had no income and no unemployment when I got back, and the economy collapsed while we were gone, killing the already not-so-great job market.

I had some savings, and some vacation time paid out, and I got fairly decent tax refunds, but there were some months when there was just no money for the bills. Mom helped sometimes, so now I was really shorting her retirement, because that’s where it was coming from, and the church helped sometimes, and eleven months to the day later I am working again.

It is not enough to cover everything, so I have charged medicine, and I charge the cable bill, which on one level makes the credit card payment cover two bill (credit card and cable), but is no way to get ahead, but the money is just not there. A lot of things that seem like options are not.

For example, my sister-in-law suggested cancelling the cable. Well, that is television, internet, and phone actually, two of which are necessary for a job hunter, and getting the phone that way took a bill away from my mother, who is also stretched thin. Also, to lock in the lower rate, I signed a two-year contract back when I was employed. My cell phone is also on a contract, which will come up eventually, but again, as a non-driver and job hunter that phone is important.

Selling the house could get me out of debt, because even though it is not a great housing market, I could recover my mortgage and other debts without charging too much, but then I am not just homeless, but I am also evicting my mother, sisters, and pets, and we are not going to find a less expensive place to live. One advantage of a place built in the ‘70’s is that it has four bedrooms and a large yard. My house payment is about $1200 a month. I can’t do better.

Here’s my other problem. My current contract (which could end next week anyway) does not cover healthcare. Diabetes is a pre-existing condition. I don’t have enough money for my current bills, and there is no way that I can handle the sort of exorbitant coverage that would be available if I could find someone to take me.

Again, there is some responsibility here, because even though I clearly do have the gene for diabetes, I am sure that my weight triggered it becoming active, and I know I could have taken better care of myself over the years. That being said, there was nothing malicious there, and no willful laziness. There was some genetic tendency, and some societal shift in that direction, and some choices to prioritize other things over fitness, which did include jobs and helping others. (There’s a whole complicated other topic there.)

Therefore, when I picked up my insulin in January and found out that the price had gone up $7, I nearly started to cry in the pharmacy. (It’s over a $100 now. I am on the uninsured discount program too; it just doesn’t help much with injectables.) This is why sometimes I will go without my medicine for a few days, because I can’t afford it or I can’t afford the needles, even though my family helps a lot, and would want to help more, but how much can you ask of people who are already broke? And this is why I am out of Lisinopril, and almost out of Metformin, and I need to go back to the doctor, but she said that I needed to get my eye exam done before I come back, and I cannot afford to pay an ophthalmologist right now. Maybe I am making bad choices, but where is the good choice?

People mention free clinics, but those are practically mythical. I was being badgered to call Virginia Garcia, and I did, and they are useless. They take two uninsured people a week, and it is first come first served, but you need to call in the same week. If they are already full, you try again next week. They should just sell raffle tickets and be done with it. I thought going through the sliding scale discussion would be bad, but I can’t even get there.

So yes, I would love nationalized healthcare, where it does not matter who my employer is, or if I am employed. And the fact that all of these discount places for poor people seem to expect that you will have some kind of insurance really gives pause. Exactly how bad are their plans?

So, that’s where I am financially and physically. I have not always made good decisions, but I also don’t know anyone who can say that. I can say that I have not been lazy or tried to freeload. I have helped others where I could and still try to do so. So why don’t you want me to have healthcare? What have I ever done to you?

Yes, that’s taking it kind of personally, but I am a person, and I don’t believe that I am that much of an exception.