Rough Waters

I haven't posted anything lately because I can't find the desire. The only desire I have is to get some things off my chest.

Currently I am living in a relatively low rent 3 bedroom 2 bedroom (where'd that extra bedroom come from?) apartment. Before I moved in, the landlord didn't paint, repair a bedroom door that has no doorknob because the hole where it goes is torn up, patch a leaky roof, clean the nasty, sticky carpets or do anything, really. My son's paternal grandfather kinda rushed him, so it's halfway understandable. But there was nothing stopping him from fixing those things after we moved in. In August I was let go from a temporary position that I happened to love. I loved the people, the job, the environment, everything about that place made me happy to show up every day. But stuff happens and I knew it was a temp position. I filed for unemployment and made my sorry butt go to Social Services to apply for all the help they could offer. After two weeks of being bullshitted around and two unemployment checks, I received two letters. One from unemployment stating a previous employer (as in, 3 jobs ago) was contesting my unemployment and that my payments were being held pending an investigation. The other letter was from Social Services stating I made too much in unemployment for my 2 person family to get financial assistance (like rent assistance and help with my electric bill). The same letter said I was rejected for EBT (aka food stamps) because I was already getting them (funny, since we've had next to nothing to eat for the last two weeks) and I'd receive a different letter for the results of my Medicaid application. Long story short: No income whatsoever from anywhere and no way to get my kid his 2 yr boosters... *sigh*

I've been in this position before, but I was a single, childless girl barely in her 20s. Now I'm a single mother, almost 30 with a 2yo to feed. I can't be homeless while his mostly absent father waits for any reason to nail me to the floor for no reason other than to prove he can. I won't get into his life because it's a joke and it just makes me even more angry that everyone let him stand there and act like a wronged father when at the first chance, he stopped having anything to do with "his" son whatsoever.

I'm at the end of my rope. I'm "letting" my son's grandparents take him as often as they want because I have next to nothing to feed him. When I say next to nothing, I mean, I fed him 3 spoonfuls of peanut butter for breakfast yesterday. We all know how delicious that is and fun, but as a meal? Maybe if you've decided to semi-starve yourself. He's eaten the last bag of popcorn, the last of the leftover tuna-mac and now we're working on the left over chili-slash-soup from Tuesday. My pantry has 7 cans of random food, from pumpkin to mixed vegetables. The very last thing we have are two chicken breasts, a cup of milk and some flour. I'll probably make chicken and dumplings tomorrow because Ick will be coming home in the afternoon.

I made a call to WIC where I could at least get the bare essentials and was reduced to tears because the woman didn't understand when I told her I was living off of nothing. Literally, nothing. In fact, my bank account is overdrawn because my car insurance (on a 91 Corolla rust bucket) came out when I had fifteen cents to my name.

I could ask my parents for help, but my father once told me that I had no business having a kid and, "I hope they take him away from you." My stepmother sends packages every once in a while with a few items of clothing and maybe a toy for Ick, which is nice, but I can't ask her for financial assistance because she'd have my "dad" to deal with. And she's not exactly a loving, worrying, helping mother type anyway. I do have other family members (they all live in other states) but there's not one person I feel has the ability to just throw money at me. Not that that's what I'm asking for, but that's how it feels.

I've applied to 10 jobs in the last two days. I'm looking, scouring job sites, picking up applications and doing everything in my power to get a job for which I'm qualified (as in, I don't need a college degree). I'm trying to get my uneducated butt in school so I can have a degree so that I, too, can get a job for which I am highly overqualified but for some reason, that's the rule rather than the exception these days. The financial aid will help, too since (as far as I know) I'll be getting a cost of living adjustment (meaning more money).

I'm trying. I'm praying. I'm begging. I'm crying. I don't know what on earth I'm supposed to be doing because I must be missing something. I must be doing something wrong because I see no light at the end of this tunnel. Between thinly veiled threats of eviction, an empty pantry and my tears I see nothing but more of the same.

I've been needing to get these things off my chest and out of my head. I feel bad complaining to the two friends I have because they also have it rough. One is also a single mother (almost divorced) and being forced to pay most of her paycheck to her almost ex so she and her son can stay in the only home her little boy has ever known. My other friend is a newly married wife of a college student, so it's not like they're any better off. My point is, I want to let it out without someone looking away because they're too ashamed to admit they can't help when it's so glaringly obvious I need it. I'm not out to guilt a single person out of a single dollar. I'm out to get these troubles outside of me where they can stop festering as much and let me be, even for a few minutes.

I'm praying and I'll keep praying. I'm trying not to worry and trying to do my best and work as hard as I can towards getting a job and into school. I will get through this, but first I have to go through it.

The American INjustice System, Part One: My Experience

*Please note: My son’s father shall be called Bob in order to protect myself from getting into any trouble.

11 days after my son was born, I left New York State and moved to North Carolina to live with family. After I’d been in North Carolina about two weeks I was approached by a sheriff’s deputy who said the father of my new baby “was concerned because he can’t get in touch with you.” I replied, “I’ve been sending him pictures of the baby every day, have communicated with text messages and have talked to him on the phone at least once.” He informed me that he was just doing his job and was glad we were okay and that he would report back with the news.

The next week the sheriff’s department tried to serve me. My son’s father was trying to take custody away from me after 10 months of nearly total absence. A deputy pulled my aunt over claiming she ran a stop sign but really attempting to find me concealed in her car. They rang the doorbell at dark, early morning hours and dark, late night hours when no normal person answers the door unless they are expecting someone. I was advised by a lawyer, off the record, to not answer the door. If I cannot be served, there cannot be a court date.

Unfortunately, that did not fly for the NYS Supreme Family Court. I filed paperwork in North Carolina hoping it would happen before the date in NY. The judge we had was extremely sympathetic and was very accommodating for me because I did not have a lawyer. Yes, “a man who represents himself has a fool for a client.” He called the judge who was given our case in NY and they both decided that the case needed to be tried there because my son was born in NY, therefore that state had jurisdiction.

Eventually, the judge ruled that I had to leave my wonderful full time job with great pay, an extensive support system of family and friends and a secure home to go back to that specific county in NY because my son’s father lived there. My lawyer (read: free, overworked, underpaid, miserable, hate-their-job county worker) was a child-less, selfish and snotty product of this town and a family with lots of disposable income. She yelled at me after refusing to listen, causing me to collapse in tears of frustration, stress and anger. She coerced me to give in to their requests with threats of “court dates until your kid is grown if you don’t just agree.” I moved into an apartment that was falling apart, I had no job for almost 5 months, was getting food stamps and cash assistance from the county as well as WIC food checks. Yup, I was living off the government because the INjustice system thought it would be better for my son.

We moved back at the end of December 2009. I have struggled with minimum wage, part time hours, outrageous rent, foot-dragging county assistance workers and reliable means of transportation since day one. I loathe this small town, ghetto-fied, dying dot on the map of an otherwise beautiful state.

My son, who is now almost 2 years old, sees his father perhaps once a month if he’s lucky. Usually it’s an accident and only happens when Bob* stops by his parents’ house or camp for food and money while Ick is with his “Gamma” and “Papa.”

We have been to court two other times with me finally withdrawing my petition to modify at the advisement of my second court appointed lawyer. My goal in life is to become a Doctor of Pharmacy and that is an education not available to me in this county which I cannot leave without court papers allowing me to do so.

In order to get that permission I must prove the following: better job, home, daycare, doctor, and a full support system of friends and family. His father, meanwhile, has only to live here. He doesn’t even have to see our son or interact with him or be a parent in any fashion to keep my son from living a better life. Like most parents, I want my son to have a better adult life than I do. To do that, I must give him the advantages of freedom of choice that money provides. In NY I have no family except my sister who is here temporarily and will be gone before winter. I have two friends whom I rarely see. The “support system” is nothing more than my son’s paternal grandparents.

Ah, yes. The driving force behind Bob’s actions in court: the general deceit, outright lies and ridiculous claims. These seemingly sweet, small town folks want their grandson down the street more than they want him to have a better life than can be obtained in a place where a business closes down every week and the census has shown a mass-exodus for the last five years. There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting your grandchildren or any family near you. It’s what I want for myself to be honest. There is something wrong with telling the mother of your grandson, “Why do you want to get a PharmD? It’s really hard, you know. Why don’t you just be a pharmacy technician? You can make like $13 an hour.” Yes, because an hourly wage is better than a six figure salary, isn’t it? Yes, it’s good to strive for low class when your dreams are upper-middle class. Yes, it’s perfectly okay to settle for a job any adult can do when you have the intelligence and drive to be more and go farther.

I will attend classes starting this fall in preparation of transferring to a university with a PharmD program. When I have gone as far as I can in this Yankee podunk town, I will once again file a petition to modify with the American INjustice system and hope for the best.

My experience with the American INjustice System has been heart breaking. I have been stripped of dignity, I have been shown in a light of cruelty and heartlessness and I have been coerced by the very people who were sent to help. In fact, the judge told me I was destroying my son with my petition and repeated court appearances. There has been no justice, only prejudice. My second lawyer said, “The law is what it is and we have to work within it. There are precedents that dictate how these kinds of cases go. If I could change the law, I would. But it is what it is and until it changes, we have to work within it as best we can.”

That is a cop out and an excuse. Precedents are merely that: previous decisions on cases that are guidelines and do not apply to every single case. We have amendments for a reason. We have political figures that make laws every day and change them, too. We can change the American INjustice System with passion, common sense and representatives who are in tune with the people they are representing.

Coming Soon… Part Two: Criminal Cases of the American INjustice System