After yesterday’s post regarding families receiving government assistance who report they are having difficulty in feeding their household on less than $600 a month….I started second guessing myself.  Had I been too harsh?  Had I passed judgment on someone whose situation I didn’t really take enough time to understand?

Then I snapped out of it.  In my industry, there are months that go by when I do not make a penny. We have had to learn to spread funds across many months to make up for the lean times – and lately, it has been extremely lean. 

We struggle to get by, to pay the bills.  My job change (completely voluntary, I know) back at the end of February meant that every penny that came in was from my own effort, and with the market the way it is, we have had to economize, bigtime.   We are driving cars that are 16 and 18 years old. 

Fortunately, PC has been able to bring in a little income, but it’s not enough in a month to even make our house payment.  We’ve always scraped by, and by keeping a positive outlook and being resourceful, we’ve made the most of what opportunities have presented themselves. 

I know how it feels to worry about how to pay your bills.  I know the bone-chilling fear of worrying that you won’t be able to afford to pay the mortgage, or whether or not you can afford to fill the car with gas.  But I also know that worry without action is just a senseless way to give yourself a heart attack. 

Some time back, I wrote about how poverty is a state of mind.  Someone who goes on national public radio and says their government assistance is not enough and who squanders what they do get on junk—-their poverty is going to stick to them like dried orange soda.  They’re going to teach their kids that it’s okay to complain about a gift (really, that’s what it is).  In forty years, what are those kids going to remember about food they grew up eating?  Who knows?

I have ten older siblings.  My parents were never well off.  In the years just before I was born, they lived on a rented farm and by all accounts, it was tough.  There were periods of time when there wasn’t a lot of variety to the diet, when my dad struggled to bring home enough money to pay the bills, when it was so crowded and cramped that three of my brothers slept in the barn. 

Forty-plus years later, one sister recalls how much fun she had with her brothers and sisters out there.  Another talks about the beautiful rose bushes that were next to the house.  And one sibling can’t say the name of the farm without shuddering, recalling privation and poverty.  Over and over, it is recounted what a terrible time it was out on the farm, how tiresome pancakes and milk soup with noodles became, how horrible it was not to have enough.

How is it that someone can continue to feel poor and deprived for forty years after leaving a place?  Because to this day, the memory of that farm reveals more about the person than the place.  I know, I wasn’t there personally.  But I see how it is when a person makes a decision about what memory they will drag along and which they will leave behind. 

I worry about saying to my daughter “We can’t afford…” something or another.  I mean, I don’t worry about saying it once or twice, but I don’t want it to be a mantra.  I’ve said to her that such and such costs x dollars, and if we spent money on that, then we would have to think twice about buying something else. Or I say “We’re saving our money by buying just what we need so that next summer, we can use some of that money for a trip to [whatever place].”  I just remember hearing “we can’t afford” and feeling deprived – I heard “can’t” and sometimes I think it’s better for a child to hear “We’ve chosen to….” do something. 

We’ve chosen to spend our food dollars on basic items and use up what’s in our pantry because we want to be able to use our remaining money for other things we need and want.  We’ve chosen to embrace it as a challenge and a sort of game, so that it’s more pleasant and we feel a sense of control over the outcome.  We’ve chosen to talk about it with our friends so they understand the potential opportunities they have for themselves if they decide to do the same thing, or so they can tell us their own choices to help us do even better.

And we’ve chosen to call ourselves frugal instead of poor, to be careful instead of broke, to be grateful instead of bitter.  Those choices are the difference between hope and despair, and can mean nothing at all or everything in the world.   What do you need to let go of to make a better choice for yourself?  What memory are you going to choose to carry with you for the next forty years?