BS: How poor have you ever been?

Subject: RE: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: number 6
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:37 PM

Been pretty lucky all my life. I was married when I was going to college ... didn't have much by some standards ... but to us back then, we we're the richest people on earth.

sIx

Subject: RE: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: Janie
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:33 PM

Hi Don,

It is not often that people are willing or have the opportunity to talk about what it is like to be poor. Thanks for starting this.

I have often, even mostly, been broke, but never what I would call poor. In part because we live pretty simply, I have never yet been out of work, (but I think that day is on the near horizon) and so have always been able to cover basic needs, and in part because we have family that can provide a safety net, both fiscally and emotionally.

Have you seen or read the book "Nickle and Dimed in America"?

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:29 PM

Um, the time when mayonnaise to eat on bread was a luxury. I don't mean mayonnaise PLUS a sandwich filler like meat-- I mean, a touch of mayo just to flavor and moisten the bread, and nothing else.

And going with my mom as a child to look into empty house's windows after midnight by flashlight, to see the houses might be fit to ask the absentee owner if he could be persuaded to let us renovate and rent. Houses no one had lived in for a LONG time. Houses we would suddenly lose as soon as they became worthy of sale to a "real" owner.

Living in a canvas tent in midwinter snow with a sleeping bag made of blankets handstitched together.

Living in a house with no heat in a cold, damp Arkansas winter.

And eating nothing but oatmeal for most of a year until my teeth began to loosen and my skin began to break down.

Of course each of these was relatively luxurious considering the alternatives. I won't even count the foodstamps/welfare period where I did fairly well. But the "medical care" nearly killed me.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:27 PM

Have not really experienced that this time around. My parents were pretty poor in the early years, but I don't think I was much aware of it at the time. I've been short of money, but never short of food or a place to stay.

Poverty of the soul? That's another matter. Have experienced a fair bit of that from time to time.

Subject: RE: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:26 PM

Would money be enjoyed more by those who have it, or those who don't?

Why am I asking rhetorical questions?

Subject: BS: How poor have you ever been?
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Mar 06 - 10:20 PM

I have known poverty in its fullness for about 10 years.
The kind where there is no car to escape the storm.
Admitedly it was virtually an experimental poverty compared to total homelessness since I had welfare, family, friends and best of all love to save me from abject poverty.
There is working poverty, poverty of the soul and many other flavors but I think people are undeservedly embarrased about the circumstances of poverty (the poor but proud crowd)

I recall how Monty Python tore me up with their "I was so poor that...joke"

I don't know if anyone else wants to share but I think I can reluctantly say of poverty that "If you haven't tried it, you have missed some great lessons of life"

My dad always said whether you are rich or poor its good to have money.