How poor was 'ya?

[waterboy]

My wife and I play a competitive little game with each other that involves recounting stories of our impoverished, but happy, families growing up. Something to show the kids how much better things are for their generation and how we live a much more material life now.

She has three sisters and a brother, grew up in fifties rural Wisconsin on a single income school teacher's salary. In contrast, I grew up in fifties inner city Tulsa with two brothers and a sister on a single income, house painter's salary.

It wasn't the "Leave It To Beaver" experience for either of us. More like "Lassie" or "Dennis the Menace" surroundings.

Anyway, here's a recent example. "Honey, we were so poor that when we drove by those shotgun houses along the expressway that look so drab and small, we were envious that people had it so good in the suburbs."

Her response?. "We didn't have any suburbs".
She usually wins.

So how poor were you?

[cannon_fodder]

Unfortunately, growing up I lived fairly comfortably - however... when I got to the "real world" my wife, son and I lived in a 25 year old trailer in the slums with 2 roommates while we both working (me second shift, her on the weekends) and both going to school.  Honestly ate mostly potatoes and ramen noodles.  Drove an k-car and a 1972 VW bug.  NO insurance for my wife and I - just barely afforded it for the boy.

It was super ghetto (someone stole the light fixture off my trailer - twice), we were dirt poor, and it was worlds of fun in hindsight.  In many ways, I was happier being dirt poor... nothing to worry about really.  It sucked at the time of course, but the stories - oh the stories.

[Johnboy976]

I lived very comfortably. My father was the leading Orthopedic surgeon at a top orthopedic practice in Tulsa. However, we were always taught to be responsible with our money. We never lived in excess. It all had to do with my parents being raised in lower-income situations all throughout their childhoods and early twenties.

As for now, I live mostly on a VERY small income. My wife and I are both grad students, as well as priests in the Anglican Church. We hardly have time to breath, and barely enough money to eat and pay bills. And yet our bank account keeps getting bigger. We must be doing something right... I'll tell you, this has been a great experience. That sounds weird, but it has been a great experience. Living poor has opened my eyes.

[RecycleMichael]

I was so poor that I would give my paycheck to the bus driver as exact change.

We was so poor my Daddy unplugged the clocks when we went to bed.

My family was so poor we put penny candy on layaway.

We was so poor we ate cereal with a fork to save milk.

My parents were so poor they got married for the rice.

[waterboy]

We weren't always poor. That is the real beauty of America. Its wealth is mobile and fluctuating. We flourished at times and scrounged at other times. Depression era parents knew how to make things last and store necessities during plentiful times.

Non necessities were a different story. We were so poor that Dad made us slink in the back seat when buying tickets to the drive-in movie so he could claim we were under 10. It always worked!

One winter was so cold and poor the whole family slept in the dining room of our old house that only had one floor furnace there. It wasn't long after that dad had central air installed.

I shared my first car with my older sister. A 1955 Plymouth Belvedere.

Was so poor in college my wife and I applied for commodities (pre welfare checks!). Ate canned beef, real butter and boxes of soft cheese. Was better than the dog food my neighbor ate.

[Ed W]

I was so poor that I had to ask people to loan me their pocket lint.

[cks511]

Spam made up our 'steak night'.  I still like Spam no matter what's in it.

[restored2x]

We was so poor...
    When my dad got into a car accident and needed a plate in his head - all we could afford was a paper plate.

I know, we've all heard that one -
Real story:

I grew up in what was the seventh largest city in the US, yet we still had an outhouse (in the 70s) - no hot water, no bath, no shower. The only way we got rid of roaches was when we couldn't afford propane in the winter and the cold would kill off all the roaches. We would shoplift our food on a daily basis.

I've been poor, and I've been not poor (a relative term) - Not Poor is better.

[Hometown]

My mother was a secretary at Tuloma Oil Company, a subsidiary of Standard Oil of Indiana (Tuloma moved to Chicago in the 70s).  We were raised on her salary and sometimes spotty child support payment from my father.  We grew up in Lortondale, and when I look back on the way we lived, I realize how every purchase was a value purchase.  My mother always said that when people in Tulsa found out she worked for an oil company they upped the price for her.  When I went to work for the Ft. Worth Star Telegram at the age of 27 my mother remarked that I was making more money than she had ever made.  This was shocking to me because I had always thought of her as the ultimate professional.  Now that I'm working in Tulsa I've gained new insight into her low rate of pay.

I guess we lived a good but very thrifty life growing up, but I do remember eating discarded produce (boiled the heck out of it) from outside a grocery story on Haight Street in San Francisco and selling blood to get some pocket change, a little later in my life.

[pmcalk]

My parents married & had kids when they were very young--before they had real jobs.  So when I was young we didn't have a whole lot, though I wouldn't say we were poor.  My mom often tells the story of when my sister wanted a hula hoop when she was only a few years old.  My mom told her no, it was too expensive.  For months after that, everytime my sister saw someone with a hula hoop, she would say, "look, mom--they have a too expensive hula hoop."  Kids really know how to guilt their parents without even trying.  I believe she got a hula hoop for Christmas that year.

My kids think we are poor because we have an old house (1915).  And we have hardwood floors, not carpeting.  Honestly, my kids think that only the rich have carpeting.

[Conan71]

I'd describe my poor periods as hard-scrabble, but not destitute.

My dad died when I was 8 and I don't think my mother made a whole lot of money back then, but she managed to keep us in a nice house on her income and SSI survivor's benefits (she and Dad had divorced a year before he died so it was benefit checks for my brother and I only).  She talks now about how there were so many times she didn't know how she was going to make it the first few years, but she was good at keeping that hidden from us.  We were kept pretty disciplined about wants vs. needs without her looking like a witch.  It's probably from that I learned to take care of things and make them last longer.

I've gone through two periods of self-imposed relative poverty.  One was 20 years ago when I moved to Kansas City to try and further an auto racing career.  I wound up working on a construction clean-up crew and lived in an un-finished basement under a duplex in a very blue-collar section on the Kansas side of the border.  I was known as the "cellar rat" by my roommates.

The other was about five years ago when I set up an apartment at the business I used to own when my ex wife and I separated.  I ripped a toilet out, installed a shower pan and FRP on the walls for a shower.  I had a five gal. hot water tank (it was probably half full of sediment) so that meant I got a nice 2 minute or less shower every day.  It was feast or famine.  I might go two weeks with near zero income while trying to finish up a major project and have to bum Ramen noodles off friends.  Okay, that's stretching it a bit, but it was tight at times.  I had left a very good paying job in the chemical industry to run that business full-time.  I questioned the wisdom in that many, many times.

Basically, I went from living in a nice 3500 sq. ft. far south Tulsa house to a 200 sq. ft. room in a lay-up concrete building in the middle of an industrial park to save money so that my kids wouldn't see a huge disruption in their lifestyle.

These days, I'm no longer a cellar rat or shop rat, I make more than I did running my own business, not quite much as I did in the career before that, but I have to say I'm the happiest I've ever been and I'm better off for having some relatively hard-scrabble periods in my life.