Down And Out In America -- AZ Edition

once i had a railroad...

Published on April 7, 2005 By Gene Nash In Misc

[This is going to be long, rambling, and hazy from lack of details. I apologize in advance. I don't even know why I'm writing it, other than to kick start my writing.]

A couple hours drive south from where Gideon wrote his "Down And Out In America" series, I find myself sitting on the California/Nevada/Arizona border contemplating my own crisis.

Perfect Timing

The thing that sucks is, if this had happened just a couple of months later it wouldn't have been a crisis at all. My income has long been scheduled to almost double this June as another income stream kicks in. To be left with nothing just months short of doubling is frustrating as hell. So instead of almost doubling my income, it will have been lessened (come July -- till then it non-existent). It would have been a problem, but not a crisis. There go all the plans I'd made.

The immediate concern is making up for 3 months missing income.

I've been taking the Abraham Lincoln approach of, "If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend six hours sharpening my ax." Unfortunately, I don't know how much time I have. Certainly not as much as I would hope. It's easier to play that when you know exactly how much time you have. I think I've got the ax sharpened enough, but the cutting is slow. Too slow.

Most of my ideas would take too long to produce results. I have only days to a couple weeks to at least show, "Hey, the money will be there on X day. Thank you for your patience." The options are limited, but there are options. That's where my efforts are going.

Rental Follies

I spent a year paying the rent ahead of time to hopefully garner some good will. At least that bought a measure of understanding. I don't know how much time I have left, but I fear it isn't enough.

It didn't help that I was flipping through a book last night and it recommended that if a tenant is late at all with the rent to not listen "to any sob stories," but immediately start proceedings and get the bum thrown out in as little as 30 days.

Great -- just what I need bouncing around my brain.

The Plan So Far

The way I see it, my best hope is to capitalize as much as I can on my knowledge and talent. I'm actually way too smart to be in this situation, but I let my illness get the better of me. It's a matter of whether or not I can overcome my health limitations enough and beat the ever ticking clock to stave off disaster.

I'd feared losing the Internet access because I'm hoping a can use some of these products laying around that I have rights to and my marketing skills to bring in some relatively quick cash. (The ax sharpening was honing my ideas for this.) If I lost the Internet access that path would have been closed. I couldn't run a business from a one hour per day library stop.

Next up on the fear agenda was the car insurance. If I can't move fast enough (which I can't, damn me) or things don't fly, a "real" job has to be an option. It might wreck my recovery but maybe I can pull it out for a month or two? Maybe? It has to be on the plate, anyway. If there's no car because the insurance lapsed, that gig would have been up.

I've made the charity rounds. There's not much out there. If I had little kids I'd have a shot (especially if I was a woman). But this society doesn't think much of a man -- regardless of health -- who can't at all times be he-man hunter/gatherer. We'd rather see somebody totally destroyed than put a little effort into keeping them a viable member of society. Just ask all the people who had to make themselves destitute just to get medicare or die.

Nonetheless, I might have found a charity to cover the electric and gas bills. Nona Campici kicked in a few dollars as well, so the Internet access and car insurance are also covered. That's no small miracle, actually. There's not enough for gas for the car, but at least when there is gas I can drive it legally. Paying the phone bill is still an issue on the Internet access front, but at least it's not due yet. I can blow off the water bill till next month; as long as it's less than $25 overdue they don't care.

Now the main problem is the rent. The clock is ticking and it's a matter of how quickly I can generate $375 dollars for this already overdue month, plus that much for the next couple of months.

It's highly doable. I'm just not too confident right now it's doable by me. I'm scared, but I'm still functioning -- so far.

Will my health hold out? Will I move fast enough? Can I somehow bring enough in and come out okay on the other side? This should be interesting.

[Damn, I don't even know if I should post this. I keep remembering other things I wanted to say, but I can't find a place to fit them in. Then I wonder why I wrote it to begin with, or why I would even consider posting it. I should be trying to do something money producing, not typing yet another stupid blog article.]

Comments

No one has commented on this article. Be the first!

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!