I agree totally. I thought this was supposed to be a quality site designed to bring people together to affect those changes. That was sort of the way the ad in myspace presented it. That is what brought me here in the first place. Saddly when I came in here a year and half ago desperately seeking help I got responded to immediately. Unfortunately the women that responded were extremely viscious as they ran me through the metephorical racks of the Spanish Inquisition. I was called names and slandered. When I offered for anyone who wanted to to investigate me anytime they so chose unbeknownst to me somehow that to them was even more proof of my worthlessness. I was called even more names. So, I found women talking about how giving they were then those same women ripped me apart for asking for help. Then they said they were exercising tough love. That all I wanted was handouts and they were teaching me how to better care for myself. They threw out stock answers of programs that I was already on, did not exist here, or did not do what they said they did. When I pointed that out they said it was proof that I was lazy and just wanted handouts. Ironicall I wanted help getting my career going. I have enough pictures now for a show. That’s a lot of hard work especially when your speciality is pointillism. I said the pictures were done; but, not matted, framed or shrinkwrapped. I do not even have a proper portfolio to transport my largest 18X24 works. I am not in the right part of the country for a reputable gallery to show in. So transportation is at issue and possibly childcare as well since I am a single woman raising her granddaughter. I laid it all out and again and again I was told about the bus, food stamps, etc. And here I was saying I wanted off of those things and provide foor us myself. for that I was put down of not being ‘grateful’ for all their wonderful suggestions. Their treatment of me was quite a kick in the teeth. I was even told to get out of the Change the World section and participate in ‘other discussions’ and this was after being accused of using this computer for ‘entertainment’! It took me a little time to recover. But once I did I have been trying ever since to turn the topics to more important issues. Namely poverty in America. Though surviving it daily I tend to concentrate more heavily on the Welfare face of poverty. It has been a year and half; but, I think I may be finally making a tiny dent.

Thanks, kiddo. I just hope that someone kicks it up into high gear. I do not think I can survive another summer of same old same old. I miss the ocean so much my heart is reduced to tatters. 21 years is just pure torture. 21 years having surgeries, homeless shelters, homes owned by slum land lords. Homes that should have been condemed; yet, Section 8 approved them for living in. 21 years of hearing about other peoples vacations. Watching others move up into better homes, furnishings, cars, etc while my stuff just deterioted and was never replaced. Or replaced with other ‘junk’. Watching others pile into their cars to go to a pool or restaurant or amusement park while we go for "another walk". I feel like I am finally losing the fight to keep my sanity. So I hope He does something and fast. I have been told that I can’t have it all overnight; but, the way I see it I kind of deserve it. I’ve got 21 years of back pay, 21 years of LIVING coming to me. I have served 21 years in the prison of  poverty and obscurity all for the crime of being hurt on the job and loopholed out of suing and for leaving an abusive husband. I left him and he received compassion and helps while I have been hated, villafied and raked through the coals thousands of times. the last vacation I experienced I was 14 years old. Now I am 46. I just want what anyone else wants LIFE. not survival. You hang in there too, sister.

I am sorry. Even now I am praying for you. Can you qualify forSection 8? I think it is in every State; but, I am not sure. If you lived here I would find things you need in the dumpster. Sometimes I find brand new toys and other things. I find for anyone who has need. If I find clothes I take them home and wash them. Then if they do not work for Shea or me then I find someone who needs them or I donate them to Share and Care who gives them away free. I will not give to Salvation Army of Goodwill; because, they will not give anything away for free or a very reduced rate if it is the best someone can do. If someone walks in in the dead of winter without coat or socks they will not help them. I know because my daughter walked into a Salvation Army church one day dressed like that. All she asked for was to use the phone. She was told no and promptly turned away. I also know from experience that all that money raised at Christmas time is not used for their Christmas toy program. Not here it is not. But they way they do the red kettle fund raising people give thinking it is. If asked they say that money is used for all their other ‘programs’ throughout the year. Please stay in here or blog else where and raise cane. People need to know. They have not been told the truth. They do not know that the Welfare system (of which there are many kinds i.e. Social Security, SSI, SSD, Welfare and even VA)is extremely antiquated. They do not understand that it is decades behind the true costs of living. Maybe if we yell enough we will finally wake people up. Maybe we can get them to investigate and shut down many of these so called ‘programs’, ‘agencies’, and ‘charities’. Maybe we can get them to help demand changes in the system including  desperately needed long over-due raises. And maybe we can convince them that the best way to help people is to do it personally, not trust some other ‘program’ or ‘charity’ to do the right thing with their money. Maybe we can get them to push the government into affecting these changes and without raising or threatening to raise taxes. It makes no sense that a murder serving a life sentence has more money spent on his behalf in a year than a single mother of one or two kids. It is a crime that that murder is gauranteed three balanced meals a day, housing, a bed to sleep in not just a floor, heat, air and clothing even if it is not what they want. I do not want to wear my sons old shirts; but, I do not want to be topless either. While the murder is eating well ther mother and children are living on ramean soup. He has access to gym material she bench presses her furniture if she has any and her children. she may not have heat or air. He does. And no one complains about their tax money going to provide for his needs. We have done nothig wrong. Our children have done noting wrong; yet, we are continually villafied. We deserve better.

You have given me what help you could. You have given me kindness. For that I am truely grateful.

But this new reform is not fixing things. It has just found a way to hide the poor from the public. It limited one problem while making another bigger. They are throwing people off of welfare. But they are still not giving them the resources to get off themselves. In this reform there are no provisions to provide transportation and childcare for mothers while job hunting. So they are stopped dead at thier front doors. Would you hire a woman with a hot, tired, hungry, screaming baby in her lap, a toddler tugging at her skirts to leave and she herself looking like she just stepped right off the farm or out of a hurricane? LOL. This sounds implausible; but, sadly that is the case. Would you hire someone that is drenched in sweat from walking two miles to drop off the kids at daycare and then another seven to get to your business? Of course not! And these are just two of the main issues. Sometimes clothes and makeup are a factor. My shirts are my sons old work shirts and my jeans are from the dumpster. I have some makeup but the newest is over five years old so it may not be any good. Would you hire me? Then there are job skills. Even a job $2.00 above minimum wage is not going to support a woman with only one child. What about two or three or more children? Where I am the going rate for childcare is $155.00 a week for one child. Before you answer college scholorships, how will she get to school? Without that first a scholorship is moot point. As for benefits that do not end they do not end if you are diabled. Yes a blessing for us that are disabled. But also a curse. We are forever relegated to a life on the sidelines forever just watching LIFE pass us by, never able to join in the game.

Oh, how many millions of times I’ve felt the same way. But, I rise up again if only for a moment and then again. We need to fight! Because we DO NOT deserve this meager existence. We need need to raise our voices up to the heavens and shout with all our mights. We need to talk and talk until people finally listen. We can not affect change from our lowly postions ourselves. So we need to get others, others who have more pull, more clout to join us in our quests for equality. You especially served this country to the best of your ability,  you deserve better. You deserve to be honored not thrown away into some dusty corner of obscurity. Yell, Deniseann! Yell with all your might!

Absolutely true!

Very, very well said, Shirely. Why is it that people listen to and name as experts those that have never experienced what they propose to know; but, when someone who has lived it speaks they say we do not know what we are talking about? Maybe they are afraid of the truth. Because maybe to admit it is to realize that should some unforseen tragedy befall them then they are in for a very unpleasant life and they can not face that possibility.

Ashley, I do not know how well you are doing now; but, a friend taught me some things that have been life changing for me. She told me to try a Living Foods diet also known as Raw Foods diet. It is not really a diet it is a way of life. I have been able to cut down on my pain killers by 1/3. I also do not drink tap water as it makes my colitis flare up. I drink only spring water or sometimes juice, preferably not from concentrate. I hope this helps.

Fair question. I am taking a risk by piggybacking off of someone in my apartment complex. I do not know who it is.

I am right there with you honey. A work injury 20 some years ago left me the same on the outside; but, suffering with chronic pain ever since. Years later I was diagnosed with severe fibromyalgia, severe chronic fatigue syndrome and chronic back pain due to a car wreck several years before the work injury. Worse being a single parent the injuy knocked me out of the work force so I was forced to turn to government assistence to keep my family together. People seem to think that you do not have the ‘right’ to be ‘invisibly disabled’ if it means getting ‘assistance’ to survive. They do not understand and think that I am faking if they do not see me leaning heavily on my cane with my face constantly contorted in a grimice of pain. I want to be happy. I do not focus on the pain. I want to live as best I can. They do not realize that my legs one second fine the next can be screaming with pain and buckle out from under me. I took several bad falls beforeI finally conceded years later than I should have in getting a cane. It was too embarrassing to me to be puplically seen with it. I did not even want my children to see me that way. People can be very cruel when you do not fit the image they want you to fit. I am a very intelligent and intelectual person. I am also very talented and gifted in art, photography and poetry. It has been hard not having friends of my intellectual calibur to converse with for over 20 years due to the stereotuype, that poor in wallet means poor in intelligence. People also judge according to ‘give statistics’. Ihey think I should feel they way some ‘expert’ says I ought to feel. They think that pain can not come and go numerous times throughtout a day. They do not even understand how I can swell and unswell numerous times throughout the day. How can shoe and ring sizes change so often. They think it is not possible so they deny the very thing they can see.

I also understand the learning disability. My youngest daughter though well above average IQ has dyslexia and ADD. She was treated as a problem child in her school. To ‘motivate’ her to do better they shamed her, put her in detention several times a week, refused to let her perform with her swing chior’s public performances ( This class was co-curricular not extra-curricular so how they could deny her the public practice I do not know. It was just too much embarrassment for her to explain to her classmates why their choreography was completely messed up by her no-show at an event. She started cutting school for the first time in her life. And for the first time ever I had a reason not to be angry with my child for cutting. Her dreams of becoming a dancer were smashed. Now she will not even discuss it without flying into a rage and vehemently denies having wanted to dance, own her own dance shool and teach it.). and scrutinized her every move or non-movement. I finally had to pull her out and put her in an alternative school. Unfortunately I did not do it soon enough. She became a cutter and absolutely refuses to acknowledge that she is dyslexic. And why should she her own school said right in front of her that they did not beleive in dyslexia. She dropped out of the alternative school; but, then decided not to be held back and got her GED. Now she is studying welding in Job Corps.

I too am done hiding. People can think what they want. If they are not wise enough to get to know me instead of judging my empty wallet, Welfare stigma and invisible disability, then they are not worthy of my friendship anyway. I am a rich woman. I am rich in smiles, compliments, kindness, love, compassion and generousity. I have plenty of treasures to share with those smart enough to SEE.

If you can afford that ice cream then you haven’t begun to feel the hard times. It’s been years since I could truely afford a ‘stress reducing snack’. Now if I eat’ comfort’ food it most likely came off the ground. Yes, I said that right. Things are tough when you are grateful for the food off the ground. In these tough times I have to rely on the dumpster for clothes and other needs. But as things get tougher my comfort is in digging through the dumpster even harder so that I can find clothes and other items for others in need as well. The harder it is for me the more I realize how hard it is for others. And some people can not yet square their shoulders and dig through the dumpster. So I do it for them and save them the embarrassment. If others want to think the worst of me when they drive by and see what I am doing that is their loss. I am a great person woth getting to know. I am merely taking care of needs as my resources allow. Someday I hope to find an angel to help me get my art and photography into good galleries then I can do more to help others. Until then saving someone else embarrassment while helping to provide for their material needs (even if slightly used) is my comfort food.

Thanks!!!

I forgot to mention that the peices that might be mistaken for poster like works are pointillisms. Depending on the picture it took anywhere from weeks to months to produce one picture. The average is two weeks for a 9X12 to four months for a 18X24.

I have over fifty peices of amaziing art in my collection. Someday I hope to share it with the world. It is my own works. I look forward to the day when this conversation will come up and someone will name one of my works. Of course my work is why I invested in this laptop a year and half ago in the first place. I have hoped to find a hands on angel to help me get my works out to the public. It is definately who you know that shapes (or not) one’s career. Or how much money you have yourself to get it going.  I shudder to think how many other amazingly talented (talented in all areas, sports, intellect, arts, music, business, etc.) people are unknown not because of their ability, or quality of work; but, because their poverty keeps them shut up in the darkness of anonimity.

That being said I love MC Escher. I have a couple old calendars of his work. There is also a young local artist named Tyler Kissel and his work sets my creative juices flowing. Some day I wish to own some of his peices. I would also be honored to go to a show of his works someday as I beleive he truely deserves.

For anyone interested some (definately not all) of my works can be found at these locations: www.myspace.com/blueccs album 1 is photography, 2 is art/ www.zooqoo.com username Christine Cline/ and www.redbubble.com username blueccs