The Invisibility and Shame of Being Poor

 

I was recently driving along an area of SE Portland near where my sons and I grew up. On the corner of the street was a church and seeing it brought back a memory of standing in a long line, waiting to receive "Government Cheese." I was so happy to receive such a boon.  I was given cheese and butter and pasta and flour and powdered milk. And that night my sons and I feasted on the sweetest macaroni and cheese around.

My sons and I lived in poverty for many years. When their father left, I was the sole supporter of my two sons. At our divorce, it was decreed that their father would give me $200 a month in child support. At the time, I had no other income and applied for welfare and food stamps. 

I've always been the kind of person who does what she needs to do in order to get through whatever needs to be throughed (yes, I made up that word); therefore, I took what I could in order to feed my kids and pay the bills. I plucked on. 

Food stamps are interesting. They came in a little packet/tablet like the tickets used to come for rides at Disneyland--"A" rides, "B" rides--but instead they were one dollars of play money, five dollars of play money, or 10 dollars of play money. And I would tear what I needed out of the packet. We also received in return as change "food stamp coins," just to make sure we were spending all our stamp allotment on food.  I was grateful of these stamps because they assured my sons would eat.  Of course I was grateful but we who had "government handouts" needed to demonstrate that gratefulness. Otherwise, we just looked like a gimmiegimmielazyscumbags. This show of gratitude was an unwritten rule when in the Welfare Office, the grocery store, on the street in line for government cheese.

The unfortunate thing about food stamps was that the people in line behind you were aware that that you were using food stamps to buy groceries. I could hear the people behind me whispering (just loud enough for me to hear), as they looked over my groceries, "Hmmm...wish I could afford to buy some of these things..." or "Huh huh living off my money...." Food stamp people need a thick skin, needed to be able to smile and simply take their groceries out to the car.

The boon of government cheese was such a wonderful thing. We really did eat well from this give-out. Driving past the church the other day, I remembered the long line outside the building. I remembered how people driving past would either stare or purposely not look.  Like the signer-guy near the freeway entrance.  Most people don't look at them, hoping eye contact isn't made. Or the person riding the bike carrying bags of cans, the man wearing dirty clothes that don't fit very well, the thin dirty-faced young teen. Our behavior is truly a bimodel distribution of interaction. We who are poor are either ignored or people felt they had the right to stare or make comments. From this experience in line for government cheese, I learned to smile and pop a peace sign to the "signers" to let them know they are seen and are a human being.

In those days of mid-1970s, I mostly just plucked along, trying to ignore the stares and the comments. You do what you need to do. I eventually found placement through Welfare with Portland Public Schools Special Education Program as an aide. Welfare set me up with C.E.D.A., a program that was created in the early-1970s through President Johnson's Economic Act of 1964. 

This gimmiegimmielazyscumbag worked as an aide, got a part time job across the street of our house at Minit Mart (which became Candy's Kwik Shop), collected newspapers to take to the recycle center (they used to pay for papers), swept the store parking lot, became the weekend aide for my partner, who was a quadriplegic, started college and worked in the Speech Communication department office. 

Did I do all this in order to overcome the stigma of poverty? Maybe a bit. I was happy to get off welfare and delighted to stop using food stamps, to be judged by the community because of my income status. I was glad that my sons no longer heard the not-so-veiled comments about our food choices. But the reality was that I was also a woman who did what she needed to do in order to take care of her family. I have always been a take-charge-of-my-life person who didn't want circumstances to rule my life. 

Next time you pass a guy holding a sign near the freeway entrance, give him eye contact, a smile and the peace sign. Tell him that he is seen, that he is a human being. Show the world some love.

and so it goes
peace~~

Do Your Ears Hang Low?

 

 

 Do your ears hang low?
Do they wobble to and fro?
Can you tie ’em in a knot?
Can you tie ’em in a bow?
Can you throw ’em o’er your shoulder
Like a Continental soldier?
Do your ears hang low?

 

 

 

I have never given my ears much thought. They sit there on the side of my head and give me music and bird twitters and sweet nothings. I've thought about my little toe much more than my ears. I feel I have been neglect. I mean, the ears do so much and I have just never paid much attention to them.

Oh, I had my ear lobes pierced when I was in high school. I remember admiring them in the mirror. And then I had a second piercing sometime in my twenties or early thirties. I then became allergic to any metal for about 30 years, so earrings weren't thought about; thus, no ear itself thoughts.

But lately...well when I hit the sheets at night and settle my head in the pillow, I find my ear lobes fold over a bit uncomfortably. Here I am, all snuggled in, and I have to move my hand under my head and flip back that earlobe.

I mean, c'mon. After age 30, people tend to lose lean tissue. Your muscles, liver, kidney, and other organs may lose some of their cells. Bones may lose some of their minerals and become less dense.

We shrink down while we age. I used to be six foot tall. Now I'm 5'11, maybe even 5'10.5.  I'll never cop to it, but yeah. 

Yeah, we are getting shorter and our ears are getting longer. 

But wait! There's more!

Not only is our ears starting to sag, so is our nose! Noses and ears are made of cartilage, a flexible tissue that’s harder than skin but softer than bone. It wears down over time and doesn’t give as much support to the skin on top of it. Your skin also loses elasticity and firmness over time, and it tends to sag. Loose or sagging skin over a weaker cartilage frame makes ears and noses look longer. 

Well, that's the story. In looking up this information, I discovered when "old age" starts.  Typically, the elderly has been defined as the chronological age of 65 or older. People from 65 to 74 years old are usually considered early elderly, while those over 75 years old are referred to as late elderly. According to AARP, those under 30 believe old age hits before a person turns 60. Middle-aged respondents cited 70 as the start of old age while those 65 and older put the number closer to 74.

Thank gawd I just turned 71...
not old yet!

peace~~~

A Bit of Quilting: Add a Little Flange to Your Life

I make a lot of quilts. Each one is unique in that each one is made for someone special. Might be a family member. Might be a friend. Might be for a child in the hospital. Might be a homeless stranger in need of warmth and love.  See, my philosophy is that every quilt I make puts out a bit of positive energy into the world. I keep making quilts because the world needs more positive energy.

Quilts are also pieces of art.  It is created through choices:  a choice of fabrics, patterns, of stitching. Even the most simple quilt, sewn together by someone with little skill becomes a piece of art. It is beautiful! The borders that surround the piecing is a type of frame; it gives the center the crown of glory. But the binding, that small piece of fabric that surrounds the outer edges, is the piece that brings and holds it all together.

 

How about adding a little fun to that piece? I learned how to make a flange/piping on the binding from fabric artist Melody Crust. It's fun and easy.  As someone recently said, it is just adding a little step to regular binding.  Here's the deal: The binding is added to the quilt when it is finished, meaning after the top has been sandwiched with the batting and the backing and then quilted. The raw edges are then wrapped with fabric that binds it all together. The binding can be any width but the most common size is 2.5" by area of the quilt (plus 15"-20"). That's the size I will show you in making the flange.

To make the flange:  

 

Cut two sets of strips.  Make note the piping strip is wider than the binding strip 

• The piping cut 1.3/4" wide 
• The binding cut 1.3/8" wide

Stitch the ends of the piping strips together and the binding strips together. It helps to iron the seams open in order to have less bulk at the fold.

Sew both strips together using 1/4" seam. Press the seam toward the binding fabric.  Then fold in half and press.

With binding side down, place the binding onto the back of the quilt.  Using a walking foot or something else that will enable the even-feed feature on your sewing machine, sew the binding onto the back.  Keep the raw edges together.  Don't forget to start sewing with about an 8"-10" tail at the beginning. 

Turn the corners the same as you would turn the regular binding.  Stop stitching 1/4" from edge, fold up to create a 45 degree angle toward the corner, then fold the strip down with folded edge aligned with the top of the corner. Resume stitching :)

When you get to the first end, stop at least 8"-10" between the first start.  This will give you room to attach your ends together. A great way to end the binding so that it fits snugly is to use a clipping of the binding itself, snip snip...create a little hat... sew... measure...and sew down.

Now you wrap the binding to the front and sew down along in the ditch between the binding and the flange. Pretty cool, huh?

You will have a stitch line on the back along the edge of the binding seam. This is why I tend to use the same color thread in the bobbin as the quilting thread.

 

Piping and flange. It's easy and fun.

And so it goes
peace~~~