The time has come to get new tires for my car.

Even though I no longer work, I am married to a darling man who still has a middle class job and grew up a few rungs above me in terms of income and class status.

The difference in how we view the world is apparent in how we think about things like tires.

He assumes that of course one always buys 4 new tires and has them rotated regularly on schedule. While I have grown more used to that way of doing things, and agree that it's sensible, I explained the way poor people approach the same problem.

"The thing is," I said, "Poor people NEVER have money for 4 new or even used tires at the same time. So what you do is buy a decent used tire whenever you have one that can no longer be patched. You make sure you have towing and road service on your insurance."

Dave always urges me to write about these things because, he says, "People don't know what it's like."

Do people really want to know?

I suspect most people don't. They'd rather ignore poverty. Poverty serves a purpose. If we solved poverty, who would willingly do the dangerous or boring jobs for minimum wage? It's much easier to shake our heads and wonder why poor people don't just work harder and stop being poor. Heaven forbid we offer them health care with even one penny of our tax money.

ETA: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2005/09/03/being-poor/

Link provided by <lj user="almighty_patsy> --Thank you so much!

More Than Just A Whore: Sex Work, Firefly and Audience Engagement.

Another interesting discussion of Joss Whedon's work, with great comments, can be found here.

While I am a huge Joss fan, I don't think everything he does is perfect. However, he's making a serious effort to take diversity seriously and if he sometimes falls a bit short, at least he's trying. So few in Hollywood even try.

Poor people are not some alien race, devoid of the same feelings and desires that you have. They're not bad people or even necessarily weak people. They're not criminal or violent or lazy or stupid. They're just poor. --Larry Conley, Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist

http://www.salon.com/news/primary_sources/2008/03/18/obama_speech/index.html

Brilliant!

ETA:

http://www.salon.com/mwt/col/tenn/2007/09/24/poverty/index.html

The letters in response are great too.

In my head I'm working out the details for an essay on comparing levels of poverty to life in the middle class. The details are almost worked out. I wish that I also could talk to some people from various levels in the upper middle class and above.

What I'm picturing is talking about how a person in each stratum might deal with acquiring food, transportation, attitudes and beliefs about education, how their class experience affects their outlook and level of optimism, risk taking financially, handling credit, housing situation, etc.

All I know about the upper classes in regard to these things are the stereotypical portayals in movies and tv. I know how often they get it wrong when portraying my class, so I have little confidence in these sources.

I have a lot of writing projects coming to mind with the expectation that soon I'll have a bit of time to actually sit down and write. Maybe I'll be so busy in January that I'll never want to go to work again. ;)

Of course, I know enough about the writing business not to expect instant wealth. That's why I've always kept a day job. For that matter, in recent years I haven't wanted to get into the business end of writing at all. It's become an increasingly frustrating business, more and more commercial in nature. I felt that I'd rather have writing available for free online than to fight with an editor or publisher about what sells.

Since I'll have some time off anyway, I figure why not send some stories out and see what happens. If they never sell I can always put them online. Or maybe gather up enough for a book and self publish.

28 more days to go before I'm free!