Frugal….not cheap!

Once again I was waken up by the radio announcer and his callers declaring the end is near.  I swear I am going to change the channel one day, but in retrospect it gives me something to ponder throughout my day.

I began to remember back in 1990, when I was about as broke as I could be.  I was trying to raise my son on my own, I say trying because I didn’t think I was succeeding.  He had become a teenager and getting clothes at the thrift store was becoming embarrassing for him.  Believe me, he never griped about it and he had every right to, but it was 1990 for Christ’s sake and he wanted to be in style, and who could blame him, the clothes were fab then.  Quick!  Picture M.C. Hammer.

I was working two jobs at the time.  One a full time job and the other as an apartment manager.  It gave me a cut in the rent so I could afford a two bedroom place, otherwise we would still be living in a one bedroom apartment.  I remember every two weeks trying to make it to the next payday on $40.00, after paying rent, gas,  groceries and a department store credit card that I had to help supplement clothes, like underwear.

There were times, when I would call my parents and asked if they could buy my son a new pair of glasses, because I didn’t have the money. (Thank you mom and dad from the bottom of my heart).  Can you imagine not being able to provide a pair of prescription glasses for your child?

The reason I am bringing this up, because even though things are tough out there, even though people lost their homes, even though they lost their jobs, times are as tough as they have always been.

Give me the equivalent amount of money today as I was making in 1990, same equivalent apartment, etc., I wouldn’t be able to do any better than I was doing then.

Most people don’t even know about this because I was part of the American culture that nobody paid attention to.  The single woman with her children with no child support.  Fast forward to 2009,  nineteen years later and everything is pretty much the same.  Single women with their children and STILL no child support trying to make it in this world.

The recession has hit a lot of people, but there is a section of the population that hasn’t even noticed, because they are trying to survive just like they always have and just like a generation of single women with children have done before them.