Essay Contest
Poor Me, Poor You
Incite Change Essay Contest #1: Poverty
She sighs as she looks at the nearly empty tube of toothpaste. Instead of squeezing out the last bits of paste or cutting open the tube to scrape the scraps, she runs hot water over her empty toothbrush. This is the second day in a row she’s gone toothpaste-less. It’s only the second week of the month and she’s already spent her $ 50.00 worth of food stamps which doesn’t cover non-food items like toothpaste, anyway. She won’t get her SSI check until the first.
This month his check went to pay rent and the phone bill. Next month it will have to be rent, car insurance, and registration. If he still has a job next month. He hopes he won’t get another parking ticket while his car isn’t registered or covered by insurance. He has too many unpaid parking tickets as it is. One more and they’ll boot his car and take it to the impound lot. He won’t be able to come up with the impound fees and pay the tickets, let alone make sure he has registration and insurance to get the car back. He'd have to write off the car and lose his job in the process.
She’s basically given up on looking for jobs. Taking several buses for several hours just to go to a job interview downtown that she knows she won’t get anyway is becoming too much. Getting there, interviewing, and getting back home before the kids get out of school is impossible. She’s already defaulted on her student loan because her degree is useless these days. And child support is sporadic at best.
Given the choice between food and a pack of cigarettes, he chooses cigarettes every time. Nicotine is an appetite suppressant. And the cost of a pack of 20 cigarettes is about the same as a meal at the Micky Dees down the street from the homeless shelter.
Each of these stories is based on truth. My truth. I’ve been a part of tax-paying the workforce for 38 years. At a time when I ought to be thinking about retirement, I am instead working side hustles just to get the monthly bills covered.
When My girls were little and their dad was overseas in the army, after paying rent and daycare I had $93.00 at the end of the month with which to pay car payments, car insurance, buy food, pay the phone bill, and keep my car maintained and full of gas. I earned too much to qualify for AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children), California’s welfare system which included food stamps and a small check for qualifying families. We didn’t qualify.
I would buy cheap food and feed the girls first and eat their leftovers. I hid the toilet paper and would bring them 3 to 5 squares depending on the number (1 or 2) of their bathroom activities. I couldn’t afford the quarters for the laundromat, so I washed our clothes in the bathtub. We lived in a studio apartment. There were no bedrooms. Just a big square with a bathroom and a kitchen. I made a makeshift bedroom for the girls using a tall wardrobe and a blanket over an inexpertly hung line. Their daycare provided lunch, but no snacks, so I sent them bologna mayonnaise tubes. I worked a 40 hour week and never got to see my kids. Eventually, I quit and qualified for AFDC. We had more food, but fewer nonfood items. We survived, though never comfortably.
The inaugural Incite Change Essay Contest is here!!!
Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to write an essay of no more than 500 words and no fewer than 50 words on the monthly topic, poverty. You may write a personal essay, social criticism, offer solutions, or simply rale against the societies in which poverty is endemic. Satire and poetry are welcome as well. As long as your essay follows all rules and guidelines (see below for the link to all the links) and is submitted before the deadline, you’ll be in the running for first (and only) place. The first-place prize is $10.00.
You read that right!
Ten whole dollars.
Unfortunately, we have a very limited amount of funds so it looks like we’ll only be able to have ten contests with prizes. If you’d like to see more contests, follow the link below to find out how to donate to the TBI cause.
Please use the kicker Essay Contest and the subtitle Incite Change Essay Contest #1: Poverty. (Please come up with a unique title other than the theme of the contest) The contest topic will be released on the first Wednesday of every month. The deadline for submission will be the following Tuesday. Editors will deliberate for a week with the winner to be announced the following day.
April’s contest schedule:
- April 7-13 submissions
- April 14-20 deliberations
- April 21 Winner announcement
Incite Change Essay Contest #1: Poverty
GO!
One link to link them all
Reuben Salsa Marla Bishop Melissa R. Mendelson Marilyn Flower Chris Hedges Edward Anderson Demeter deLune