Being poor, working hard

Life is not easy. It isn’t easy when you have a routine and you’re following it, and it isn’t easy when you’re in the midst of change and upheaval. It especially isn’t easy when you’re poor. You have to work so much harder than people with health and enough money for a simple, but decent life. Here’s a simple example.

Cleaning. You’re too poor to buy a proper vacuum, and the place where you rent has carpet. So you get a secondhand vacuum that probably doesn’t have great suction, and the hose attachment doesn’t work very well. (This may not be a great example for those of you who don’t believe in cleanliness.) When you vacuum, the vacuum does a so-so job of picking up stuff, and you can’t just vacuum the upholstery or anything off the floor. And the vacuum doesn’t roll easily, the pedal that lets the handle move at different angles doesn’t work properly, so you’re left lugging the heavy thing around over every little bump and lump on the floor. It’s heavy. But you have to clean - you have a child that likes to sit on the floor and play. Or you have a dog and a tick phobia…

In any case, you can’t go buy a new vacuum. You make do, you work your fingers to dry, red stubs, and get an aching back, sore limbs, fatigue, etc., making things as good as you can get them. God forbid you get sick, lose your health.

If you miss cleaning regularly, your abode gets dirty, you are more likely to get sick. Not only that, but the dingier things get, the worse you feel psychologically, the deeper into the hole you are dropping….

You wind up having to work so much harder than people with money just to climb out of the hole. As a cautionary tale, these are a few key points:

1 - Never let yourself slide so far down you have to work twice as hard to get back out.
2 - If you’re down, realize you have to work very hard to get out.
3 - It’s easier to maintain a relatively decent life than it is to live on in sickness and poverty.

The third point may be the most important one to remember. If you’re used to a cushy life, it may be hard to understand.

If you’re used to things just working, or things being done for you, it can be incredibly hard to understand that if no one’s doing things for you, you absolutely must do for yourself. You will have to work harder to get to where you were, or just stay afloat. People aren’t actually so forgiving of others being down and out. And they make assumptions about you when you are down and out that may not be true, and yet you may need those people’s help more than ever. Yet another point at which it becomes so difficult being poor.

Let me just finish by remarking on the things that people need to do better:
Sleep - a good bed, enough warmth, decent bedroom in a proper sleeping environment.
Food - good options, good knowledge of food preparation (go Jamie Oliver!!! Luv ya.) You absolutely cannot do better than you are doing if you are not eating properly.
Education - not only food education, but training in how to prioritize, think logically. What comes first, buying all organic food, or saving to buy a decent bed that stops hurting your back? The conundrums are not always easy to solve, therefore, you need your wits about you as much as possible.

Life is hard, rife with little problems, not easily solved.