Poor Like Me

                         In the year 2008 I embarked on a strange, sometimes threatening, yet always inspiring voyage of discovery.

                         It began , fittingly enough, beside the sea. It was the end of a long forth of july weekend and I and several male acquaintances were sitting on a deck at a house in Narraganset having drinks My wife had taken our two daughters into into town for gourmet ice cream. My editor and erstwhile employer was there and I was slightly on edge because I knew that he would soon be giving me my next assignment and at the time was beginning to feel that his constant focus on the private lives of stars, while making the magazine a lot of money was not doing my literary reputation much good.

                                 The wives were not in sight. They had apparently wandered off somewhere and Charles, an acquaintance that had something to do with Purdue University and was not of the first caliber intellectually said

“Ever want go to go out for cigarettes and not come back?

The consensus seemed to be that no one present had even considered the notion. The silence that followed the question however indicated that in fact the idea had at least been considered.

                               Carl Sturgeon, the eminent black social theorist, as usual,  brought us back to the world of the living.

                               “You might want to look at it another way. My friend the psychoanalyst never seems to tire of telling me about female patients that are obsessed with having a dozen lovers   or more even”

               “That's why they're on the couch!” shouted Tom Maxwell the television sports announcer, who had had plenty to drink.

                  “Monogamy is a comparatively recent innovation.” Said Lewis Vanderfield, a WASP who never hesitated to let people know it. Then he added the kicker, “Especially among your people Carl, right?.”

                  After a pause Sturgeon asked“Which people do you refer to, the successful writers or the homosexuals?

              That was a bit of a low blow. Lewis had recently been introducing the notion of his marriage to a long time partner and had not been particularly encouraged by the men with conventional families.  Carl was to all appearances happily married to a white woman.   It drove  some of the white fellows crazy, and he knew it and enjoyed it

                         My editor, never one to miss the opportunity to mention money  said 

                  “Well a lot of the one parent homes in black families have to be attributed to economic factors.”

                       Timothy, an Irish fellow who was known to prefer black women interjected, “Either that or they ust live to fuck”

Mr Analytical, your's truly, could not help but say.

                        “That seems provable or disprovable but to me it seems l;ike expediency. If there's no chance of a long term commitment one settles for a short term commitment.”

                          Sturgeon suggested,

                       “Not to destroy any illusions, but women in the underclass are always characterized as “hot to trot.”   Consider the fiery Spanish fireballs, and southern European women in general. There may just be black women that are more focused on providing for their families because they know if they don't do it no one will.

                      Charles returned to the conversation.

“I kinda fancy the notion of a dozen different lovers at the same time.”

The Irishman said, You know the one about the bull and the cow. A man and his wife are looking at a bull and a cow and the wife says , “You know a bull can ejaculate as many as two dozen times a day, and the husband replies, “Yeah, but it's not always with the same cow!”

                              Even with the lubricants this crowd did not roar with laughter, but the point of the humor was well taken. I looked at my watch. It was almost four. Out on the bay before us the amateur sailors had gone in leaving the open waters to the better ones who were taking advantage of the late day increase in breeze.

Gary, who had been so far silent spoke up. It was good to hear his voice again. He had gone through a long troubling relationship with a wife that had not been forthcoming about her affair with her employer and indeed had gone so far as to accuse Gary of wife abuse, a heinous crime.

                       If the woman or man walks out that's nothing. It's a clean break. A lot of times it dudn't happen that way though. You know you keep thinking you're going to get back together with her and you wonder what it is you done wrong.”

                      “Oh Christ,” whispered Timmy.

                   Gary went on, in a world of his own. It was generally thought that Gary was a nice enough guy, but he kept looking for reasons where there were no reasons.

“It's just the way the big boy made people, you know.” said Lewis, who could show compassion sometimes, despite being a Wasp.

                        “She was a bitch, plain and simple” said Timmy.

                    “Then why did I love her? Why did I love a bitch? Why didn't I find a nice girl to marry?”

           It was at that point that I came to a realization. The story of the tender loving wife, who stays with her man despite physical and mental abuse , is familiar. Could it not work the other way around?

                 Gary was a giver. He is, as the expression goes, someone who would give you the shirt off his back. Jessica was a taker. She'd take the shirt of your back and then ask for the shoes and socks too. They lasted as a couple then, only as long as their two neurotic adaptions fit together – that is to say, until Gary ran out of new things to give Jessica

“Well eventually she walked out on you, right? Someone asked.

“She left me for a bartender – for a fucking bartender”

                  Actually the bartender was three or four boyfriends ago and the last I heard she had worked her way out to a condominium salesman, but it was plain, she wasn't coming back. Gary was a tapped out mine – a saturated market – an emotional ghostown haunted by the shadows of people long gone.

                  My editor tapped me on the shoulder and motioned to me that we take a walk. When we got to the hedge that lead to the stairway that led down to the beach. He began to speak.

                              “Got an assignment for you. My contacts assure me that the economies gblow, or actually it's already started but it's going to keep crashing for the foreseeable future. I began to feel a cold chill down my spine.

                    “I'm not following” I said. But I was. And if there's anything worse then sucking up to the rick it's suck down to the poor, but he had his mind made up.

“Poor like me” he said- “You go underground and write a sob story about the abused but honest, the trod upon but noble,poor. We'll make a fucking boatload of money. You do like Dicken's- play off the guilt complexes of the rich. They know they are to blame but they sure as shit aren't going to make things right so you write a story that says they are not to blame and even if they were to blame the poor like being poor because it build , uhh”

“Moral Character?”I said

“Absolutely” he said

                         “What about my family, my wife, my house, my dog?”

                    “We're ,making a virtue out of a vice.”

                     “What is that supposed to mean?”

                    “What does it sound like?”

                       “You're going to want to talk to you wife.”

                            “What the fuck does she have to do with this?”

                             “A lot. Look John, you have a lot of questions and frankly I can't answer them. In time the answers will come. I guarantee that, but for now you're going to have to put your head down and get on with the job at hand. I worked out this deal in part to keep your wife happy, because she still has strong feelings for you, even if she doesn’t think the marriage is working out.”

“What are you talking about? What the fuck are you talking about? The marriage was working yesterday and now it's not working today?”

                             “John you might as well hear it from me, but your marriage was not working yesterday. Truth is me and Maureen have been lovers for about a year. She was not happy and she came to me.”

                        “You son of a bitch...   a year?”

                    “Stay calm Johnny. Truth is there were others as well. One night stands, things like that. I mean, I care for at least and I hope we can stay friends.”

                             “Stay friends? How about I get a gun and blow your fucking head off – then we can stay friends”

                        “It won't bring her back. She's gone boyo. I've kept you on out of, I don't know, sympathy, I guess and that's why if you come to me with something I can sell in a few months or a year I promise you I will do my best to make a deal somewhere.”

                                        “How about my wife, can you make a deal for her? Is she included in the bargain?”

                          “Maureen makes her own deals. You know that.”

                             I once again looked out at the reggatta and said the obvious,

                            “I can't believe this is real.”

                               “John, believe me, this is all going to work out for the best because right now you have other problems to take care of and you could do without a messy family situation.”

                         “No Eric, I could do with a messy family situation. Did you ever hear the words, for better or worse, in sickness and health for richer or poorer.”

He didn't say anything . He just smiled that smile that I'd seen before in other situations, but never so creul. He had gotten the better of me. He talked her out of marriage, or bribed her or something. Part of me couldn't accept what he said but another part of me knew damn well the game was over. He was so confident and from here on he would have as little to do with me as possible.

                               He was right about one thing though. The next few months were busy. I began to realize I had many new friends . Friends like the Bank of America, Chase, AT&T and other smaller friends. They were all willing to work with me to pay off my debt – no matter how long it took and foolishly as it turned out, I trusted them. I went from a five hundred thousand dollar credit line to virtually nothing in six months. Each time I'd make a payment, trying to get accounts in order, they would tighten the noose making it more difficult.

Try though I may, I looked through the papers but sow no jobs for men with post graduate degrees in Ancient Irish literature and a minor in history. There were bright spots, but not many. I'd been reduced to going to local libraries to use the facilities and in one I saw something that warmed my heart.

                          He was about six foot two an had a square jaw and a perfect physique. His face was unmarked by any imbalance or deformity. It may have been Anatole France (who was a fine writer despite having one of the smallest brains ever measured) who made reference to a person who had everything going for himself except one thng; “Those social graces that open all doors.” Here was a fellow that obviously had those social graces, as long as he didn't open his mouth.

                            He was without question, “executive material”such as I have seen in a hundred boardrooms in a thousand magazine articles and by the millions walking the canyons of Wall Street. His clothing, his shoes, his haircuts even – everything reeked class. The fact that he had not a brain in his head would not defer Pepsi Cola or Nabisoc from naming him CEO.

Oh, thou blond god! Thee of perfect teeth, had I but a tenth of your social graces I could count myself fortunate. And yet , everyday, there he was in the library, with a stack of business cards and a stack of resumes sending them out by the dozen and hundreds because you see - the people receiving the resumes had no idea of what a good impression he made. He would have been better served had he sent a nude photo of himself lifting a silicone enhanced babe over his head and smiling his best Ronnie Reagan smile.

                        Misery indeed does love company.  Are you miserable? Let me keep you company. I'm good at it. Do you know the story of the whore? She's meeting a client for the first time and says “If you want a nun or a schoolgirl it's fifty bucks extra but if you want me at my best it's regular price.”

                               You see, with people who are happy I cannot relate. You give me a heartbroken loser who had seen his world turn to garbage and them I can get along with. Heroes don't need me. Winners don't need me.

                                As to the mysterious journey into the world of the poor. Well that was just a come one, a lead in, a con job, a way of getting your attention. Could I write a book about it? Are you could kidding? Certainly.

                             Consider this. Its something cops know and use. I'm in the town of New Paltz which is a college town just upstate new york. A lot of the locals are not widely traveled and what is more the school tends to draw more then it's fair share adults who are fond of children. Mostly its an innocent exploitation but naturally they are very sensitive as to the topic.

                             One such chap who owned a store catering to children also rented rooms and I went several times to try to rent a room from him. After awhile it became apparent that it was a no go – which didn't bother me so much as the fact that he could not bring himself to fabricate some sort of excuse.

                              A similar case happened with a married woman friend of mine. I was willing to leave her alone but another man, married , wanted to get in her pants – so the problem was I was basically in the way. It's a problem I have – the last thing a criminal wants is a cop on the scene so they have to create some cause to get rid of that obstacle.

                              I could tell when this was happening and ordinarily, even if it is against the law I will let it pass. This is not a perfect world and besides a suspicion is not evidence. You may have heard about my nemesis in the form of the small town librarians. Well, after confronting their kiddie toy owner and getting effectively blown off I enter the library and say“Anybody got any hot fourteenyear old boy's?”or something to that effect. After seeing me for three years nearly everyday you would think they'd cutme some slack, but no – they had conniptions and agreed among themselves that I was sick and they were right to feel disgusted. They must have decided I was some sicko at least a dozen times, but who’s counting?

I never got to finish the joke either, It's when I rub my hands together and say “hmmm, saucy!”

                              By the way I don't really think the people in the library are child molesters – but they are very sensitive to the accusation and I apologize for making it known.

                         So anyway what this comes down to is if you really are something, something you don't really want to be, one way or another you want to be as far away from it as possible. A girl who has been assulted by her father or older brother will try to block the memory of the attack out for the rest of her life.

                            So yes, I have been poor, gone hungry gone homeless even – but you what ? I don't want to talk about it. The wound is still too fresh

But so I don't be accused of misleading the dear reader I will give you two things you might want ot know about poverty in fact I am thinking of starting a new TV Show called “Poverty – American Style!” (I suppose I'll start right after I begin the show about pedophilia and before I begin airing games from the transexual tennis league.

                           Actually (Hello Alan) one of my childhood pals grew up to be gay and now lives in frisco where he had a male partner in a doubles ice skating contest – the contest said it was no good and got taken to court which overruled the verdict and now there's male doubles in ice skating.

But back to poverty American style – this is how it's done, a escribed by a Nobel prize winner in the book the Bell Curve (which is hated more then it ought to be) The problem in the US is how to keep the poor from killing the rich. It's an old problem and the largest prison system on earth only goes part of the way towards solving it.

                                       As in the middle ages we know effectively lock up the rich in the equivalent of self sufficient manor systems which we called gated communities. In those areas where estates predominate we make sure there are plenty of police. This only solves half the problem which is how to protect the rich.

                                 The second problem is how to castrate the poor and this is done via poverty zones. In this case what we do is we place all the services need by the poor ( who are defined by their lack of income) in a certain city or area which is far away from the wealth zones. So in the same locale you will find the second hand clothing stores, the food stamps distributes, the drug and alcohol rehab centers, the low income housing and the prisons. This means that all the things needed for survival are located within walking distance of one another and by placing these zones in comparatively out of the way places there is no need to place fences around them.

                                 It's worth mentioning that this principle is also applied to entertainment centers, which, being the exclusive province of the wealthy are place in out of the way places like the mountains of Pennsylvania or even Florida, rather then as was the case in the past, the river side or ocean side of a major city – where the poor would have access.

                                    And finally as the paper of record (the NY times) never seems to tire of reminding us the notion that one gains value as one gains experience in a job is overturned in Poverty-American Style! (Trademark 2013) In the European model, which has developed over several centuries, manufacturing includes a trade union system which in turn allocates position and pay scales to apprentices and master craftsman. The US has since Reagan , effectively destroyed centuries of the collective bargaining modality buy adopting a Southern Paradigm which is based on the slave system.

                                        In the new slave state as a person weakens physically they employability also deteriorates. People in peak employment ages are forced to work long hours at low wages but then mistakenly often believe that they will see salaries increase instead , there being no workers protection laws, they are often fired as soon as their income rises above a certain level.

                               An amusing side note to this issue is the suggestion made by Former President William Clinton who said in effect that the loss of quality employment was something that had to be accepted and that the modern worker was to compensate for this by seeking employment in two or tree different occupations over the course of a working lifetime. As far as we know no one has ever taking that suggestion seriously – beginning with the former president, who successfully negated all attempts to make him change his employment.

                           The devil may be in the details but m,any a battle is won in the generalities (pardon the pun) Which is to say that smile minded bigots with lynch mobs and over active police may not present a pretty picture but they are effective in convincing people that they are not wanted and that it would better for them if they were not to “let the sun go down on them.” We are seeing that more and more as poverty become entrenched in the American Psyche.

                                  Poverty can be viewed as a disease. Like being exposed to a carcinogen the effect of periods of poverty can sometimes not be seen for decades. There were until recently many people who's outlooks were shaped by the depression of the 30's.

                             To conclude with some thoughts from my days as a research analyst in Criminal justice, I was able to study the amount and types of crimes committed in Long lsland, at the time fairly well to do, in the wake of several mini- recessions; recessions that hit individual cities and towns hard, as in the case when a major industry like Grummen Aeronautics shut down.

                                       Essentially the crimes went from targets of immediate opportunity to gradually more severe crimes and what it more they grew move violent over time. There was as constant correlation between the onset of poverty and violence. It is not unfair then to suggest that this will occur on a national scale. Then again I would not wish to underestimate the a mont of pain humans can withstand prior to rebelling.

– Tamlin