Good morning

Good Morning invisible masses.
So I am trying to wrestle with what the biggest part of my predicament is.  Predicament seems a wrong term, but for lack of something more artful I'll use that for now.  I realize I'm unemployed.  That doesn't scare me so much.  I know I can find some shitty job, I've always found work...since the age of 12 I have never spent prolonged periods not working.  This is by far the longest I have ever been without work since the age of 12.  So finding a job isn't necessarily what scares me.  Other things I have been dealing with since early childhood include but aren't limited to...
Sporadic anger
A strange mixture of confidence and insecurity
A need to prove myself
I'm trying to find a way to admit to myself that I have never been completely healthy mentally.  However armed with the faculties I DID have I was able to find successes in certain arenas.  I worked hard through high school, pretty much supported myself.  I only ate dinner at home once or twice a week, bought my own clothes and shoes, and eventually jackets etc throughout high school.  When I was 22 I bought a house, that can't be a small accomplishment.
This week has been a busy week, I have done some things that I don't like or want to do, but recognize a need coming on.  If these blogs are about honesty and finding out who I truly am and why...I am getting unemployment again, with the child support and my rent coming out of unemployment I qualify for about 70.00 a month in Food Assistance.  I'm taking it.  I don't like to, I had to apply for it when I first got out of jail, and Monday I sent in my financials and got it reopened.  I stopped getting them when I was working at the restaurant over the summer.  That was a stressful day.  yesterday I went to court for the OAS I got while saving up to get my license back.  That is taken care of for now.  While sitting in court I was able to look around at all the other people stuck in the same mire I am.  I recognized differences and similarities.
I'm hoping that I haven't slipped into this welfare needy circle to an extent that I can't get myself out.  In the same breath I am seriously considering applying for full time disability.  NOT FOREVER!  I know that somewhere inside something is broken.  The amount of stuff I can deal with in a day before I get really angry and edgy is much lower than it has been in the past.  Going to court exhausted me mentally for the day, so did going to DHS.  I want to yell at myself that I'm just being a lazy piece of shit and need to get a job and get back into things.  However I also know if anyone else yelled at me my pride would kick in and I would be willing to fight, not just fight I mean really angrily violently attack.  It's my pride mixed with the unsettling knowledge that I am not ok.

So my reason for going for possibly going for disability is two fold.  I know that it is going to take research and time to find a job that I am qualified for that will pay me enough to get there, and eat. (See previous post) I also recognize that my strongest point was once my interview.  I came across as dynamic, likable, intelligent and it was my interview that usually got me all my jobs.  I am not that person right now, my confidence is an angry reflex, and I need to find a way to address things like my jail stay in a less emotional way.
Right now thinking about those 30 days nauseate me.  I shut my eyes and feel a fury building.  I went to jail for thirty days dead broke.  The courts ordered me to pay SO much, I couldn't do it.  I re-read all my performance evaluations from five years with Cumberland County.  2006 and 2007 were stellar, as was the first half of 2008.  Then Came the ruling, and the money.  At first it was 324.00 a week.  I was going to work and losing 324 of my net every week, the anger built quickly, I tried to get it modified.  They raised it, now it was 435 a week.  I didn't have a prayer.  2009 and 2010s evaluations got worse.  Still there were good points cited.  Somehow I tried to keep it together, I kept hoping it would change, I kept hoping they'd see how broke I was.  Then the judge issued a warrant.  We went to court for a modification and a contempt hearing, I asked for relief they asked for more money and jail.  The judge said within 10 days we'd have a decision.  6 weeks later the courts mailed me a warrant to report for a thirty day sentence.
That sentence ultimately cost me my career with the Sheriff's Department.  Officially on paper I was fired for being incarcerated and unable to report to work without adequate vacation or personal time to be out of work.  Unofficially the warrant seemed so wrong, so unbelievably unfair that I fought it.  I spent a week looking for people to hear me out, to listen...this couldn't happen in the America I grew up in.  I didn't go straight to jail.  I hid, I borrowed money and had someone check me into a hotel for 2 nights under a different name.  When I did come home I kept the shades drawn, I even made a place to hide in the attic surrounded by boxes and made to look like there was no void for a person.  I decided on Friday February 25th to report.  First I went to H&R block to get my taxes done, so I could provide my share of the rent while I was gone.  I was expecting a tax return.  Then  I decided to stop home, and have a real lunch before reporting.
When I got home there were cruisers.  The police were in my driveway with guns and bullhorns trying to get me to come out.  My boss...the Sheriff had decided I was likely going to hurt myself or someone else.  Even though the warrant had yet to be entered into the computer system they were there for me.  I do not own a gun, yet the police in my driveway thought I was armed and dangerous.  They turned us away.  We drove to the jail and I reported.
I am not done yet...however in the past year I have had everything I knew to be true torn apart.  I have always been able to work more, and find a way to get by or get ahead.  Now I have the shame of jail, the fear of a court system that can take all my money and freedom, and a burning anger so intense to deal with before I can feel comfortable working...  That tax return that I was hoping for the day I went to jail.  DHS took it for child support.  When they raised my child support they made the raise retroactive by six months.  I am still paying an extra 15.00 a week, and DHS plans to take my tax return this year if I get one.  Last year they took my whole return...I still owe H&R block 300.00.
I think I'll send an S.O.S.

Please note this post is RAW...I chose not to edit or proofread this one for typos or grammar...I just shut my eyes and hit the publish button...

Economic dynamic

The Economy of a Life

Looking at hard facts objectively

Presently I am unemployed and my unemployment pays me 359.00 per week.  I do not having taxes taken out because I need every dollar I can get.  From that Child support automatically withdraws 114.00.  Leaving me with 245.00 per week, it should last until about the first week of January.  From that I pay 150 per week to cover my portion of rent and go towards monthly expenses.  With the remaining 95.00 I need to pay 90.00 per month in car insurance, buy food, give G extra towards my cell phone, and put gas in my car.  So say my insurance is 22.50 a week from that 95. I am now down to 72.50 per week.  It’s really not an acceptable number.

So I need to work clearly right, or find a way to get on full time disability for about a year so I can straighten myself out and find a job.  So let’s look at jobs available to me.

My Resume:

Construction? bleak but 10ish an hour in this economy (I was 15.00 when I left the industry)

Substitute teaching? about 60 a day if I can still pass a background check with my blemish

Security?  While I am well trained and very capable most of my credibility disappears with my incarceration, and dismissal from Cumberland County.

Retail? Looking at a starting pay around 8.00 probably closer to 7.50 I’ll look at this in a minute below

Restaurant? Wrong season most places don’t pay very well.

Fast Food? Assuming a quick ascension to manager I could make it to 10.00 an hour conceivably.  See Below.

The Economy part.

Base Pay	After taxes x.80	After Child Support -114	Monthly take home
8.00x40= 320.00	256.00	142.00	568.00
9.00= 360.00	288.00	174.00	696.00
10.00=400.00	320.00	206.00	824.00
11.00=440.00	352.00	238.00	952.00
12.00=480.00	384.00	270.00	1080.00

So assuming I can find a job within a 20 mile area that will pay one of these amounts.  On a 5 day week that’s 200 miles a week of straight commuting.  Add another 50 for getting the kids and around town BS and we are at 250.00 miles per week.  At 15 MPG I need 17 miles of gas a week at 3.70 that’s 62.00 a week for gas to get to and from work.  With an assumed rent of 600.00 a month and gas to get to this job I am at 848.00 per month.  I haven’t eaten yet.  So bare minimum in order to both work and GET TO work I need 850.00 a month.  So I need to be making AT LEAST 10.50 an hour.  Now my Child support is actually 100.00 a week but there’s an extra 15.00 a week going to arrearages.  Get this!  If I make 10.50 an hour the Child support worksheet says I should pay 122.00 a week so it is a difference of over 20%.  She could take me back to court and get an extra 22.00 a week.  Dropping me back below the amount of money I need to survive at 10.50.  So I now HAVE to get both FULL TIME and 11.00 an hour.  (Which would raise my child support another 5.00 a week) I was making over 18.00 an hour for County...

So any pointers?  How should I start my job hunt?

Ahh fuck it no one's reading anyway

So if every person is a combination of various parts both genetic and environmental.  This combination of the fires you were given and the things you have learned are what guide every microscopic decision we make.

Now while I won’t delve into what I consider normal, what I will say is that sometimes either environmental or genetic or both factors cause a deviation from what would be considered normal.  Essentially I’m referring to Abnormal Psychology.  What I am proposing here is that every facet of every personality deserves equal study.  Every nuance of a ‘healthy’ persons psyche is as important as why a depressed person loses motivation.  I believe that an environmental predisposition is completely as likely to cause depression as a chemical imbalance.  I to some extent believe that this extends to all mental health issues.  While I understand the medical community’s need for diagnosis to even recognize a ‘disease’.

I don’t believe that any mental health issue is a ‘disease’ or an illness.  Again my grey area would lapse for things like dementia, catatonia, or likely most schizophrenic cases.  However, depression, alcoholism, PTSD, Bi-polar disorder, and other typically non long term hospitalization illnesses I don’t believe are diseases.  I would argue that every person has a set of decisions that they make under certain circumstances.  The motivations are different for every individual, while the outcomes may be similar, none are the same, and as such no two will ever react exactly the same when treated.  Because of this I am not for most psycho pharmaceuticals.  I realize their place in immediately or close to eliminating alarming symptoms, however they are weakening the taker’s ability to enhance themselves.

For instance picture a body builder that took steroids, but never worked out.  This would represent someone just taking an anti-anxiety drug for nerves, or similar.  When they get near something stressful they take a pill and ‘feel’ less stress it doesn’t mean the stress isn’t there it just numbs them to it.  So our bodybuilder finally decides that he no longer wants to just feel stronger he wants to get stronger so he begins lifting weights while taking the steroids.  This is like seeing a therapist while taking meds.  You are improving your mental state; however the feedback you’re getting is modified from your own reactions because the meds are numbing you to some of that feeling.  Next we move on to the bodybuilder who decides he’s strong and doesn’t need the steroids any more.  Within a few weeks he finds his body not only can’t do as much but when he tries to engage it and make it stronger it isn’t ready because it’s looking for steroids that aren’t there.  The person who after therapy and meds feels better and wants to get away from the meds, now feels that anxiety they were suppressing before, and when they try to deal with it their body chemically is looking for meds that aren’t there, increasing the initial anxiety.

There is no doubt in my mind that I am battling something in my psyche that is holding me back.  I am not operating as efficiently as I should be upstairs.  Not as efficiently as I have in the past.  When I think back I can put together periods of time when I was operating better or worse and correspond those times with life influences.  Where I find myself now is in a largely depressive state suffering from symptoms that have been dubbed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  I understand both terms, have studied both extensively and wholly understand why the behaviors and motivations I feel fit into these two categories.  That being said; I have no health insurance, and cannot afford any treatment or medication, and honestly am not comfortable taking meds anyway.  So my only ‘treatment’ option is to go inside figure out what things are holding me back, where and why.  Then I must find out what it will take to get myself to a point where those factors cannot or won’t affect me.  Then I must cement that neural path with repetition and positive emotional feedback.  From there I must optimize my existence with every option available to someone in my socio-economic status and available mental and physical abilities.

Living Life 100.00 at a time

So without rock-steady income life must be lived differently.  I'm sure there are many different ways to handle budgeting insanity.  As someone still fairly new to this level of poor, I'm going to call mine...Living life 100.00 at a time.  What can I do that will Net me 100.00?  Find repeat.  Then it's What can I pay with 100.00?  Partial payments whatever..what's closest to being shut off.  Lol, where is the next 100.00 gonna come from?

Occupy Wall Street

So being in the mood that has dominated me for the past year or so, I have been fiddling with an increasingly dissentuous feeling growing in my gut.  There is a rather unique cross section that I sit in.  I spent over five years working in Law Enforcement at the County Jail Level.  However I also spent 30 days IN jail for what I am set to propose is the most noble, righteous reason ever.  CIVIL Contempt.  So It wasn't a criminal act that put me behind bars for 30 days and cost me the career that I swore allegiance to.  I have a curious temptation to go to Occupy Wall Street.  To camp out, to lend my resume to the cause, I'm betting there aren't too many people with Law Enforcement experience camping in the group, I could be helpful.
My cause isn't specifically against corporate greed, but rather the system that created it.  The political system that fosters politicians blind to anything other than the deals they can make while in office.  Why else would a successful business person spend millions in campaign funds to get a job that pays a few hundred thousand a year?  The system that can't see the forest for their own trees.  
I've been saying for a long time that Americans are too complacent to stand up for themselves...and here we have the first wave of dissent, the beginnings of Americans willing to say FUCK YOU...to the government that we let get oppressive and self-serving.  Of course it's disorganized...psychologically in the beginning it always is, they know it's wrong and are finally willing to stand up.  The cause will come the first time they are attacked, because eventually the enemy they want will have to try and put them down.  Then they'll be organized because the common goal will have shown itself.

Dreams and Mantric Determination

As the clock ticks past the 11:59 mark and midnight is upon me, I find myself looking inward.  I am not afraid at the moment, I am no angry, I do not feel beaten or held back.  I simply am.  The world careens around the sun, spinning and moving, it doesn't matter at what angle.  I have always been led to believe that I was a little bit smarter than the people around me.  This was fostered by teachers, parents, and occasionally looking around at what I considered to be foolishness amidst my peers.  I have never felt more humble or foolish than I do when I cannot for the life of me see a solution.  I can only see the paths that will make me happy in the moment.  So armed with little foresight, and no plan; I will walk forward while looking for the most meager measures of things with which to survive.  Any surplus will be put away for a time when there is no surplus.  I will leave no potential opportunity behind and will collect pennies towards the dollar that will someday be mine.  I need very little, but will take whatever I can get, the only thing I will not do is be lulled into the falsehood of working my way out of the pit.  I spent 20 years working as often and as hard as I could.  I didn't have many more options than I do now with next to nothing.  When I choose to apply myself to labor it will be to a specific end, of my choosing, by my rules...

Adrift

The things that matter are constantly shifting.  At the center I must find myself, and I must do it honestly. 

I am literally almost out of earthly possessions.  I own a computer, which I type on now.  I own a desk, and a bureau. I own a 1992 Ford Explorer, I will have paid 700.00 for it next week when I pay the last 150.00 of it's sale price.  At the price scrap is going for I can get 600.00 for it at the junkyard, so it doesn't have to be perfect, just run.  I own a handful of decorations and action figures that I have largely had since childhood, and a bookcase full of books.

I do not have a checking account with a positive balance.  I do not have a debit card.  I have 8.00 in my wallet and this must last me until either my unemployment resumes next Wednesday, or my last paycheck from the restaurant job comes through next Thursday.  Oddly enough I am alright with this state for the time being.  I literally have very little left to lose.  As long as I am able to come up with between 6 and 700 dollars towards my half of the monthly expenses I am not willing to worry about anything else.

I bought a house at the age of 22.

When I left my ex-wife I was 30.  I had successfully owned that house for 8 years, and was the only income for virtually that whole time.

I haven't given up, I'm just in a state of flux while I rewrite the rules I am willing to play by.  I am not about to ever put myself in a position where anything can be taken from me.  The rest of October's mission, to try to find as much free roadside firewood as I can.  While building on these blogs and networking to try to find alternative income sources.  There is more coming, very soon...

I will become the whateverlution...

Duality and balance

Hello again.
I'd like to say a few words about civil disobedience.  The most proud I have ever been in my entire life was telling people that I worked for the Cumberland County Sheriff's Department.  I'm only 34, I only worked at the jail for 63 and a half months.  I have sworn an oath to my country when I enlisted in the national guard, and an oath to the people of Maine and the County of Cumberland when I started working as a 'corrections' officer.  In the five years that I spent there I broke up many fights, I was nominated for officer of the month for breaking one up while working alone in a housing unit, I have held the feet of someone swinging from the second floor railing and pulled the rope around another person's throat out so A Sargent could cut it, I've walked on towels that covered so much blood we would have slipped if we hadn't put them down, I've pulled someone's feet to get them out of the food chute they were stuck in and then wrestled them when they tried to run away.  I learned to work the control room, and did it well, I worked maximum security, and was signed off in the booking room even though I only worked there on overtime.  I still have some contact with a lot of my former co-workers.
Three years after my divorce and after losing several desperate lawyerless appeals and not being able to pay the 435.00 per week that I was court ordered to pay in Child and Spousal support, (250 child support 185 Spousal/alimony I paid the Child support off the top of every weekly paycheck, and provided dental insurance for the children even though I wasn't court ordered to because I wanted them to have it, this was at an added cost of 17.00 per week) A Judge from the Springvale, Maine District court house found me guilty of Civil Contempt and issued a warrant for my arrest and a 30 day sentence in the York County Jail.  I was working in the Master Control room in the Cumberland County Jail when I found out about it, At the time I was actually responsible for opening and closing all the facility doors when the phone call came in.
I spent February 25th through March 26th 2011 in the York County Jail in their classification unit.  I refused protective custody and interacted, ate with, and watched TV with the regular inmates every day.  Civil Contempt is a class E misdemeanor.  However unlike most other crimes, you don't receive any mandatory good time on civil contempt.  If I had assaulted someone I would have gotten five days off during my 30 day stay.  If I had stolen from Walmart I would've gotten 7 days off during my 30 days.  If I had become a 'trustee' and worked around the jail, I would have gotten an EXTRA 10 on top of that.  I could have been out in as few as 13 days!!  However I went to jail for being poor.  I did the full 30.  I requested in writing a jury trial prior to conviction, I did not get one, I was not represented by a lawyer.  Now I am almost unemployable, and can't even re-enlist.  The Cumberland County Sheriff's department fired me on March 7th 2011, for being absent without adequate leave time.
Where will I go from here?  Am I willing to accept defeat?  Of course not...as for what direction I'm going to choose...that remains to be seen.  One thing I can say with absolute certainty.  In my darkest hours none of the places I swore my allegiance to were there.  I now owe allegiance only to those I trust completely.  I now serve one person and and one person only.  I am not without faculties, I am not without resources, skills, and physical ability.  While I might have some pretty substantial handicaps I can say with certainty that I learn faster than most of the nation.  I can say with certainty that I am in better shape than ninety percent of America.  I have no problem saying that I have lived in some tough situations, I have faced substantial adversity, and that I have a mixture of training along with a breadth of knowledge that will grow dramatically over the next few months.  What I choose to use this on depends largely on what I find out in the next few months.  Please stay tuned and learn with me.  I promise nothing, but will try to make it interesting and entertaining.

A social experiment from the beginning

                I lived in Somerville Mass. for Pre-School and Kindergarten.  I lived in Arlington Mass. for first, second, and half of third grade.  Then I moved back to Somerville for the other half of third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grades.  I went to a Catholic Kindergarten, and a Catholic school for grades four through six.  Next we moved to Cambridge for seventh and Eighth grades, and I went to a K-8 school, not a middle school.  Cambridge was formulative, I started working.  I learned how much money and self sufficiency meant to me.

                Not that I hadn’t been self-sufficient for a long time already at that point.  In Kindergarten I used to have to walk from St. Catherine’s in Somerville to Daycare.  True it was only three or four blocks, but I was barely five.  However it was in first grade I got my first taste of who I was and what I was truly capable of.  Let me explain.  During February vacation my mother didn’t have childcare for me.  I had relatives in Vermont who worked from home, and were in a position to look after me for the week.  My mother took me to South Station in Boston; she bought me a bus ticket.  I had my bag, and some change for the vending machine.  The ticket man told us that kids under twelve couldn’t ride alone.  I was six.  My mother asked a black family who was also going to Burlington if I could ride with them.  “Sure he’ll fit right in.”  Their only concern was that someone would be there to pick me up.  At White River Junction, I got some candy from the vending machines and changed buses, asking to make sure I was on the right one.  When I got to Burlington, the bus was almost a half hour early.  No one was there.  At six years old I got out the phone book, looked my uncle up and called him on a payphone.  I went to Vermont for several years during February and April Vacations.  I always rode the same way.  Alone on the bus, but in subsequent visits no one stopped us to say anything.

          I had lived in 8 different homes before I graduated high school.  I went to 6 different schools.  Both High Schools that I went to asked me not to come back without expelling me.  I wasn't a thug, tyrant, or bad-ass I just didn't seem to fit within the school environment..I was a passive aggressive behavior problem.  Now I live in Maine and am quasi employed while I explore job options after the Sheriff's Dept, and Jail...

Stay Tuned