It's the end of the month, and I'm dreaming about food. Oh the food I'll cook when I get my foodstamps!
You see, I never can make them last. I get $189.00 for three people for one month. I figure that's $2.00 a day for each of us.
Yeah, I could make it last if we ate rice and beans all month and I baked my own bread. If we never ate packaged food or bought chips or ice cream or fruit juice. Hell, even cold cereal is too expensive these days.
I've seen people in line at the store, watchin' my food being checked, lookin' at my clothes. When they see I have stamps, they look at what I've got. If there's some soda or chips, they frown like they're paying for it themselves. I can just hear them, "That's my tax money you're spending. You shouldn't spend it on anything fun." Sometimes they just come out and say it. I've learned not to get my foodstamps out until I'm ready to pay, or to hide them behind my purse as I count them out.
I'd like to see them self-righteous folks look into my kids' faces and tell them they can't ever have potato chips, not even once a month like we do, or ice cream, or any of the things they see every day on TV. They don't raise their kids like that. How do they expect me to say "no" to mine? 'Specially when my kids go without most of the month as it is.
Jeffrey, he's my oldest, he's 14; Jeffrey went to a friend's house to spend the night a few weeks ago. His eyes were so big when he talked about their food, all the cereals and crackers and chips they had, all at the same time. It hurt to hear him talk about it. I knew he wished he'd been born in one of them families. He could have had two parents, and all the food and toys and fancy lessons that I can't give him.
When he talks like that I get angry all over again at their dad. He ain't talked to them for over a year. I think Suzy, she's my little girl, doesn't even want to see him anymore. She just wants to see her half-sisters. Don't know why he keeps havin' kids when he don't support the one's he's got. I told the people from the D.A.'s office where to find him but they ain't done nothin'.
All I know to do is keep on with my studies. Someday I'll have a good
job makin' 7 or 8 dollars an hour and I'll buy my kids all the things I
can't now.