"I'm Not Dead Broke" or The Real Meaning of Depression

Sometimes it seems to me that the Universe is trying to send me a message. This often happens through the media. On Thursday night, after the torturous Dental experience, The Nurse and I went to see "Cinderella Man" with some free tickets she had acquired. Yes, it's a freeking boxing movie, but it also details a family's struggles with money during The Great Depression in a very believable way. They have utilities shut off and have to live by candlelight and steal wood to feed the stove. The family is lucky to get a mouthful of bread at one point and the parents very often go without to provide for their children. It was a good movie. It's the type of thing that has been done a million times before, but it seems fresh and interesting in spite of itself. Plus, it's not exactly an awful thing to watch Russel Crowe and Craig Bierko shirtless for a few hours.

Cosmic sign number two came when I got home and watched the latest edition of MTV's True Life called "I'm Dead Broke". There was one family of eight who lived in the most ramshackle, disgusting shack I have ever seen. They didn't have running water in the house so they used a pump out back. The rent was $280 a month and they STILL couldn't afford it and ended up getting evicted. There was also a girl living in a trailer with at least three guys who got fired from her waitressing job because a joint fell out of her pocket right in front of her manager. She was trying to go back to high school but needed to save up $500 to buy a car in order to accomplish that. She had saved up a little over $400 when someone stole it from her. She had to start all over from the beginning.

I've come to the conclusion that I am not dead broke. I have money problems, sure, but I have my rent and most of my utilities paid. I'm looking at a pretty broke few weekends, but it's nothing new. There's plenty of stuff around my apartment I can keep myself occupied with. And there IS a light at the end of the tunnel. Not with the next paycheck, but the one after that. And again, friends and neighbors, I don't live the kind of existence where money is absolutely EVERYTHING. Or at least, I like to think I don't.