Playing Opossum

Today I want to tell you a little bit about being on welfare and what poor looked like for my mom and me.

My mom and I received food stamps. I can't tell you how much. All I know is we could only go grocery shopping once per month. My mom made sure we had lots of staples. I can remember when it was the end of the month because dinner was often creamed peas made with instant milk. If you have never had instant milk, take it from me, it's not very good.

We also couldn't afford a car. That meant that almost all of our grocery trips (unless one of my mom's friends took us) we did on foot. We lived about 2-miles from the grocery...well...maybe more...and we would walk there and walk home with bags upon bags. In the cold. In the heat. But that is not what I remember. What I remember most is the fun my mom and I had on those adventures. My mom knew how to talk to me and she knew how to make anything fun. Believe when you don't have any money you find ways to make things that do not cost any money fun.

One of my most favorite things we use to do for fun during the fall was walk to the park and collect nature items for our cornucopia. Even though our cornucopia was on a plate it is one of the things I remember most. My mom would keep it on display on the kitchen table as long as possible. I can still feel the warm breeze and smell the sweet grass and pungent fallen walnuts. We never had anything fancy but we did have a lot of fun making memories.

The other part of being poor is that you can't afford repairs. Our trailer was in bad shape. The ceiling tiles would fill with water and then collapse...and there was a hole in our bathroom floor...oh yeah and mushrooms growing in the spare room. I never had friends over because I was too embarrassed. But it was what we could afford and it was home.

Oh the hole in the bathroom floor. I'll never forget my sister Stephanie had come to visit and she and my mom were coloring their hair. I've always loved the smell of hair color. I was playing in my room when I heard them shriek. It seemed that the hole in the floor was a really big deal...because a opossum came on up and into our bathroom. I remember peering in and seeing it stare back at us with it's ugly, beady eyes. And I remember I couldn't go to the bathroom until it left. That took a while.

No we didn't call the exterminator. We just waited for it to leave which it eventually did. Then my mom, my sister, and I all had a good laugh. Because that is something I learned early on, make the best of every situation and always look for the humor life brings. Who else ever had a opossum in their bathroom?