Breaking My Silence

We aren't supposed to bring it up in polite company, so I don't. But the people I hang out with, know all too well the intricacies of being poor. Not just, "I can't buy a new car," poor, but I can't fix the busted old piece of shit that I own, broke.  
Being poor in this country is largely misunderstood, over stereo-typed and generally ignored. If you are poor, the public seems to exhibit this stance that you somehow don't count. The sad part is that millions of us buy that, and we act like it too. 
I am willing to share my (our) story because, I do tons of reading about our world conditions, and I see how hard it is in my own home. I see how more each day, people are discovering that everything isn't okay, that they, like me, feel almost powerless to make any change. 
Our family has been without any formal, pay our taxes income, for almost 3 months and the jobs we had before that, didn't pay enough to meet half our bills. 
Our rent in our last residence was 1350 a month and the other bills were: water 65/mo, electric and gas 135/mo, cable, internet and phone 140/mo, car payment 200/mo, insurance 75/mo. That came to 1965, not too bad, but our payments were never due when our money came in. So all those bills also had late fees or reconnect fees with them. Those fees came to about 300 a month. We called and tried to make arrangements every time. They said no. Why would they say yes? They are making money off of my inability to get money by a certain date. All they had to do was let the clock go by and set my due date for a day that meant extra money for them every month. Our income was collectively 2900/mo. So, we had around 600 left for consumables. 
We eat a lot of vegetables and beans, and we grow our greens and root veggies. We cook most of our food from scratch and have found that buying ingredients for those meals is less expensive in the long run than buying fast food, or pre-made and frozen meals. After buying household essentials and gas, for the month we had around 400 for food. Some months we would buy a bunch of things at once and then keep back money for essentials, and some months we made smaller purchases every week. 
Now,we are out of work, and we are fortunate enough to live in a place where we are given room and board and electric. We are on food stamps for the two kids I have who are eligible. That's 660/mo. It is actually more than we had available for food before we moved, so with aware planning we can meet all our diet requirements.
The place has a well for water, with a finicky jet pump that drops pressure suddenly occasionally. It usually takes about 3 days to get that straightened around with everybody going around being really grumpy and unkempt. We don't have a hot water heater so all the showers are well-water cold. It's not bad yet, but I grew up with a well, and it isn't winter here yet. 
There is a propane tank for cooking fuel that is at about 25% and luckily we don't use too much gas.  
We are 3 months behind on the car payments. It has a bad mass air flow sensor and has a habit of stalling out when the tank is low. That happens constantly because the car gets 15mpg and gas is over 4 dollars per gallon. We don't go anywhere besides the grocery store and sometimes, the kids get a ride to or from the bus stop. 

There is a long evolution to where we are right now, and my aim at revealing all of it in this blog is to show others like me that it isn't their fault that they are where they are. They aren't powerless to help themselves, and more importantly that we can also help each other. 
I will be looking for and sharing information about poverty in this country, as well as around the world. I am an avid researcher for my own interests. I realized that if I wanted to understand a thing, I had to look at a large amount of information that related to it. May sound simple, but there is an abundance of bad and illogical information out there, and swimming through it take patience and a desire to figure it out. 
I hope that you find this blog entertaining and interesting. I have a critical view of our society today, and I like to look at alternative possibilities for solutions to our problems. 
I know I haven't figured it out yet, because I am writing a blog from the perspective of poverty. I know that some people will read this and think really judgmental things about stuff I say. That's cool, I don't mind. You're having your experience, and I am having mine, and I'm putting it out there, and I will never expect everyone to love it.