Applied for food stamps today. I’ve applied for all kinds of jobs, temp agencies, what have you.  The want ads are just bleak.  My mom looked at them yesteday, she couldn’t believe it.  Unless I want to go fishing in Alaska, there’s just nothing.  If the special deals I’ve been offering don’t pan out by May 5th, I am going to have to relinquish my car.  All kinds of magic for prosperity has been happening but right now I have to choose between my car and my storage lockers. I’d rather give up the car and get a used one (I bet there will be lots of great deals on used cars, lots of folks having to give up the second car) when I get a job than give up 50 years of the evidence of my life.

We shall see how it goes, one last email for the special website deals goes out today reminding them they have one week before the prices go up.  Don’t want to shoot myself in the foot but if I extend the deal it could be weeks before they act.  Not one person has hired me on this offer.  Not one.  It’s a great offer. They need this service.  I can only hope that they are waiting until the last minute to bite the bullet.

It makes me cry a little to think I might lose my lovely little car. But hey, when I think about what folks lost in the Great Depression, its only a car.  I have my health, my family, my coven, my friends, my sobriety.  It’s only temporary. I can get another car.  And eventually another job.  This won’t last forever.

Trying not to kick myself too hard for quitting that job last summer.  The thought of still working for The Village Jackass makes my stomach churn as much if not more than losing the car, I have to remember that. It was a calculated risk and it didn’t work out.  At least I know.  I’ve learned some things. I know what I do want right now.  What I don’t want right now.  I have a different relationship with money than I did.  I’ll probably never be a worker ant, but what was an important purchase a year ago means next to nothing, nothing, right now.

My friend is losing her house. It’s in foreclosure.  Last year her husband had an adverse reaction to a new anti-depressant.  You know, he was the .001 percent?  His entire body got a chemical burn from the inside out.  Overnight.  Think about it.  She was starting to file for divorce but couldn’t leave when that happened.  His eyelids burned off.  His lower lip came off in his hands.  His stomach, lungs, throat, intestines, colon, all third  degree burns. They packed as much of his insides with cotton and fed him with IV and forced his lungs to breathe.  He was blind for a while.  80% die from it but he survived. Barely.  Months and months in ICU simply because a dermatologist walked by the ER cubicle and said, “I know what’s wrong with him!! We have an hour tops to save his life.”  And they did.  But agony.  When he was almost ready to go home he got a Staph infection and then Pneumonia.  He lives.  Barely.  And he blames her.  She is doing all she can to get him in assisted living and help him sort his life out. She fed him by tube for months.  She nursed him.  She can’t work, the PTSD is so severe.  She did get a job 5 weeks ago but after one month fell off a ladder and damaged her back. She is losing her home, she has an 11 year old daughter, two dogs, and both her parents are dead and his parents blame her too. How could she have asked him to take an anti-depressant to save their marriage, bitch.

Unbelievable.  And this woman?  Offered to lend me money yesterday because several months ago I gave her some.  OMG.  And I sit here and worry about my car.

What is important to me has changed significantly in the past year.  I have my parents, thank the Goddess.  I have a roof over my head as long as I need it.  I have food on the table, but if I can supplement with food stamps that would be good. I have half a tank of gas and $23.  All my bills are current but the car is due today.  I need to feel I’m contributing in some good way and food stamps will keep me from having to ask for food money.  I have my brother and his lovely family.  I have so many loving friends.  Is it so wrong to want to keep the car?  No, no it isn’t.  But it might not be what happens. And I’m one of the lucky ones.

I had so hoped to have a big celebration for my 50th birthday, July 4th.  A big potluck at a park with games and fireworks and families and friends.  But all I want for my birthday right now is a job.

One day at a time.