What Gives?

I've been trying to focus this blog more on books, but something happened last week that is ticking me off, so today's blog will be slightly more political.

There are certain houses in my neighborhood that seem to have landed straight from the soap operas, but like it or not, these situations are happening in many areas. Years ago, a local resident decided to open his house to wayward teens who were a step away from juvie hall. While this is a thoughtful act, it has led a lot of miscreants to this family neighborhood. I've yet to hear of a success story from his house, but maybe only the bad seeds are making the gossip rounds. Anyway, I digress.

My next-door neighbor was a single mom for a number of years trying to raise her eight-year-old son and eleven-year-old daughter while holding two jobs to pay for her house and have any shred of a life. I'm the first to admit that she's done some things that I've thought were off the wall, but she's my neighbor and so be it. Today, she has a gem of a beau, a second daughter, and she's doing well. Her two teenagers on the other hand are about to become parents. The son is 16 and the daughter is now 19. Not exactly a prime age to become parents, especially not the son, but it's happened and now they have to grow up rather quickly.

The daughter is the reason for my post today. Her boyfriend is one of the not-so-great seeds to come from this wayward home for troubled kids. I think he deals drugs, though I can't prove it beyond the wad of cash he seems to have and his hanging out on the corner at night talking to people who drive up to him in their cars. He comes and goes from her life more than a yo-yo. Meanwhile, mom kicked her out of the house in an effort to force her to grow up and take responsibility for her soon to be born child. From my vantage point, this girl has done little in the past year but hang around and refuse to work.

She's finally gotten herself a job paying a typical Vermont salary of around $8 per hour, just barely over minimum wage. She has a baby on the way, due in a month, and has found an apartment with a rent of around $700 a month. The apartment isn't anything fancy, but it is inexpensive for the area. Meanwhile, the daughter got her act together and applied for assistance to help her and her baby survive.

Break this down at $8 an hour - that's $320 a week or around $1,400 per month. Take out taxes which usually come to around 18% around here - I'll round it down to 15% to make things easier. She's left with a little over $1,200 per month.

So here comes the rent - she's immediately left with $500 to cover her electricity (heat and water are generally covered by the cost of rent), her gas to get to work (no bus service in this area), phone for emergencies, health insurance, food for her, diapers, renter's insurance, and clothing for both her and the baby. $500 will not last long at all.

Last week, she received her letter from the state as to how much assistance she will be getting. NADA, ZIP, ZILCH. If she wants state aid, she'll have to quit her job, but they know she is capable of working because she has a job. She's left to gain income from her boyfriend who may or may not remain in the picture. Then she'll have to go after him for child support, but he's never worked a legit job that I know of, so there will be no money to get. This leaves her with the alternative of turning him in, but then he's in jail and she still might not get a cent from him while he serves his jail sentence.

While this girl is now struggling to figure out how to survive, my other neighbors, both on disability, haven't worked a day since I've lived here (15 years) because of back problems, but the back problems have never once stopped the husband from climbing up onto his roof drunk or from bending over to tie a push mower to the back of his car so that he could mow his lawn by driving around it.

The system infuriates me. It's time to step back and look at the bigger picture. This girl wants to do right but she's been slapped down. Someone who knows they are riding the system all the way to the bank has the system mastered and the state doesn't seem to check up on it to ensure people really are disabled. Plain and simple, the system is F$%KED.