Never Give Up
Trina L.C. Sonnenberg
Back in 1992, when I was a newly divorced single mother, with a toddler in tow, life was not easy. I lived in a dangerous neighborhood in the only apartment I could afford. I received a subsidy that allowed me to pay $400 a month for rent. The drug dealer in the apartment next to me, paid $50.00 a month for a bigger apartment than the one I had.
A 14 year-old child was shot to death, a block away from where I lived, over drugs. The basement laundry room was littered with used needles. Cockroaches lived there for free. Whereas most of the people living in this complex around me were on welfare, I could not get government help. Why? Because I had a job.
I worked a full time job for $6.00 per hour and that put me in an income bracket that would not allow me the comfort of food stamps or Medicaid. I had a two-year old child, and even by the standards of 1992, the money I made at my job was pitiful, but it was too much to get help. Is it any wonder that people quit their poor paying jobs to get welfare?
I didn't quit my job, instead I got a second one. I paid top dollar to live in a cesspool, along side lazy, drug dealing people, who paid a fraction of what I did for rent. To live elsewhere was just not affordable, even with two jobs. (I waited tables second shift and worked my regular job first shift.) My son went into day care, which was another expense I could not get help with. On most days, between both jobs, I'd work from 5 in the morning until 11 at night. Still I did not have enough money to be comfortable. We ate macaroni and cheese a lot in those days because it was .25 a box. We ate hot dogs too.
In a situation such as this, I could see why people gave up and got on welfare, but I would not give up. That was not the life I wanted to live. That was not the example I wanted to provide my child. So I persisted.
Eventually I found a better job and made better money, but still it was difficult, because with each passing year, the cost of living increased, but wages did not. I received no child support, and medical and child care expenses were killing me. Still, I did not give up.
I had moved us out of that horrible apartment complex to the other side of town. I thought it would be safer, until the news reported that at the gas station two blocks from my place, a girl had been shot and killed during a robbery.
Being a single mother taught me a lot about life and the way the world operates. I'd be lying if I said that the whole experience didn't make me bitter. I was very angry that I had been a tax payer for so many years and the government wouldn't help me rise above my situation.
My son had problems with his ears, so the medical bills were a struggle to pay, and the time I had to take off from work to take him to the doctor almost cost me my job.
It would have been easy to say that if $6.00 per hour was too much money then I should just quit and go on welfare. At this point I was making $10.00 an hour and it still wasn't enough to live on with a child in tow, and still I could not get help. However, I was determined to make it work. And, I did make it work.
Now my son has graduated from high school and knows the value of a hard day's work. He takes nothing for granted and appreciates all he has in his life, including me; especially me.
So, am I bitter still? Not at all. In looking at my son, I can say it was all worth it. He was worth it. I was worth it too. I learned much from those days of struggle. I learned the most important lesson of all; never give up.
I am not a materially wealthy person even to this day, but I have something more valuable than all the money in the world. I have pride in the man my little boy has become and I have pride in myself for rising above my circumstances and raising such a good child.
I learned that the only person I could depend on was myself. I had help from those who loved me, and I learned who those people were. I also learned that no one could change my life but me. Blaming the world, my ex husband, or the government for my discomfort was not going to take me to where I wanted to be. Only I could get myself to where I wanted to be and it was my job to let nothing stand in my way.
No matter how bad things may seem in the moment, every obstacle can be surmounted if you refuse to give up.
Copyright © 2010
The Trii-Zine Ezine
About the Author:
Trina L.C. Sonnenberg
Publisher - The Trii-Zine Ezine - Your Trusted Source for Internet Business and Marketing Information. EST 2001. ISSN# 1555-2276
Author of: My Journey A Lifetime of Verse, ISBN: 978-0-61516405-2
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