we're doing better. the bills are generally lower, saxy is doing well at two out of his three jobs (he doesn't get to work the third too often because the other two have him working 4-5 days a week, which translates to at least two double shifts a week). things are generally good.
and yet....
and yet having the car paid off somehow did not free up enough income to pay off credit cards and put money into savings.
and yet i'm still having to figure out how to pay things and still feed us.
and yet i still can't seem to find a way to take care of small things, like buying socks for my son.
it's driving me bonkers and making me feel like a failure at the money. i know i shouldn't if only because there's a lot of baggage from the last couple of years and even while we're in a better place in terms of jobs and housing in general, other things are going up (food and gas in particular). and we still have the storage space because there's no place to put stuff in the apartment, so that's another $100 a month that is sucked right out of us.
but i just can't figure out what the deal is. two months ago, i was paying $200/month on the car. now i'm not, and it's like the money has evaporated. the only thing i can think of is that we're still teetering on the edge of poverty, where there's still not quite enough resources to cover the needs. it just doesn't feel that way. i look around and think, we're doing well. yea, okay, we need furniture, but i've managed to keep anything from being disconnected (we had one suspension of service in the last year, with comcast, who no longer sends "we're about to suspend you" notices), and i've kept us pretty well fed. so, how is it we're still floundering around?
yesterday we had at&t come out and install digital cable. it'll supposedly save us about $50 or so a month (plus another $10 on overages for saxy's cell phone data plan). i hate the setup, but we got my e-mail to work, so we'll probably keep it to keep the savings, then reduce our package when the price goes up off special. at this point, i'm not expecting the savings to do us much good. i mean, if $200/month can disappear in a black hole, what's $50?
really hoping that, as he gets himself on his feet a bit, linnorm can contribute at least $100/month as support for taz. again, seems like a drop in the bucket right now (a very small drop in an apparently much bigger than i realized bucket), but i'll take all the drops i can get to make this better. i even applied for food stamps for my son, which is a big deal since cali gave me the heebie-jeebies for dealing with any kind of government aid (they treated you like less than scum of the earth; here in georgia, the people i've dealt with have all been nice when it comes to taz's ssi, but just the idea of applying for other benefits made me sick to my stomach). he doesn't qualify because he's under the age of 22 and living with his parents so our income counts against him and took him over the cut off.
so it's back to trying to find ways to save more and hoping it will eventually make a dent in the things that are being ignored to make the basic needs of housing, food, transportation.
i'm honestly trying not to whine about things because, like i said, things ARE better. it's just hard when a check is a bit short and i'm suddenly scrambling to cover the necessary bills plus food, and i just don't understand why things are so short when we were paying out at least $200 more two months ago. i don't get it. it's also not easy on very little sleep, with a storm headache looming, and allergies going bonkers. i'm usually congested, but i'm very rarely a sneezy/sniffly reaction person, but all i've been doing for the past week is sneezing and sniffling and praying i don't get a serious nose bleed (also rare, but has happened). And the damn hot flashes that won't reach my toes are making me cranky. so, yea, a bit more whiny than usual today.
oh, and come to think of it, i guess i can figure out where this month's "extra" $200 went: a tire and work pants for saxy.
guess the money's not so much as disappearing as my memory still sucks. lol
~*~
word of the moment: chatoyant
having a changeable luster or color with an undulating narrow band of white light
