“The love of money is the root of all evil” (1 Timothy 6:10)

Well, now that I know it’s been misquoted – I suppose this should give me a bit of hope, but no.

I hate money.

In fact, I detest it since I’ve never had any, and because I’ve never had any, it’s made me the miserable wretch I am today.

When I do have it (money) via a job, its only to serve the purpose of paying off other people or to survive.

Years ago, and before I knew that H&R Block made a huge mistake on my return, I trembled as I made vacation reservations worth ‘nearly’ a thousand bucks so that my two kids and I could take a much-deserved 5-day trip to Florida for spring break.

I’d recently been divorced (left for another woman, actually) and I felt beyond guilty about my children’s suffering, so the trip made a lot of sense to me, but the extra two grand from the government did not.

We had a nice time in the St. Pete area, and my daughter still talks about that trip today – but what it ended up costing me (since, according to my X and everyone else who’s heard the story I can’t blame H&R Block or the government), still haunts me to this day.

I don’t trust anyone or anything anymore, including myself.

I haven’t been able to move forward, get on with my so-called life, or even TRY anymore.

Shortly after returning from that trip, I was fired from my teaching position at the church I attended, and while the government hounded me for the money “I” failed to claim on my taxes, the girls I had let rent my house while I lived in my mother’s basement had moved out, having trashed the place in the meantime.  The city then contacted me about unmown grass the next-door neighbor had promised to tend if I paid him $20 a week, which I had.

He laughed about what occurred – that neighbor who took money I didn’t, really have to give, and he smiled as he gave a lame excuse about his riding mower breaking down on him.  Funny thing was, his property was maintained, and his lawn was cut while mine was now knee-high and gone to seed.

The girls destroyed the inside of the house, having not cleaned since they moved in, and their dog (which I never knew existed until after they moved out) had ripped up the drywall and carpeting.  Flies infested the place, and it took weeks to get every, last one out.  They never bothered to use the lawnmowers left inside the barn, but they did dig out an illegal fire pit in the knee-high lawn behind the barn which the city also cited me for.  They left a non-running Volkswagen bug in the driveway that sweat bees had made their new home, too.  The city didn’t like that, either and ordered me to get rid of it at my expense.  Someone from the church offered to buy the car from the girl, and while he paid her for the title, he never came for the car, which left me hanging indefinitely even after several calls to the guy begging him to take the car, and having to listen to him complain about his inability to find the time.

I had already gone through a life-shattering experience with infidelity and the shame of it all ending in divorce, as well as a final miscarriage that left me with a hysterectomy scar that refuses to go away – probably as an eternal reminder of the past, who knows.  Losing the job, and then the house was like a death-knell in my head, too.

Back to the house – when all was said and done, I eventually sold the place (with foreclosure notices looming on the horizon) for a sum of $2.61 when all was said and done.

That very night, after having moved into my mother’s basement with my two children, a woman from the mortgage company came knocking at the door demanding that I cut her a check for $475 – the mistake she made when filling out the closing costs.

“Excuse me?”  I stupidly asked.  “What mistake?  Why is this my problem?  I don’t understand.”

She became belligerent at that point, sticking her foot in the door so I couldn’t close it on her, and insisting that she would not leave until I gave her the check.  I told her at least eight times that I only made $2.61 on the sale of the house and that it was all the money I had in the world, but she cared less, insisting that she would lose her job if the mistake wasn’t rectified then and there.

“Who’s mistake?”  I demanded again, and when she threatened to sue me, I pushed her away and closed the door.

Sure enough, within a month, I received a letter from the State demanding that I pay $685 for a homestead tax thing that still makes no sense to me.

The guy who bought the VW Bug and never came for it (I had it towed at my expense to a junkyard) offered me a teaching job at the other parish to the north, and since I was broke and desperate, I took the job.  That winter, he called me into his office and showed me a letter he received from the state, insisting that they garnishee my wages to the tune of $250.  My son AND my ex had already paid the $685 bill for me, and now they were totally shaming me in front of my employer for more money that still had no logical explanation.

Worse, he told me he had paid the bill and now I owed him $250, which he wanted as soon as I received my check that week – which was at the same time I had made a crucial decision to see a doctor (uninsured as I was) about a tumor or cyst that had been growing inside me for about two years.  I cancelled the doctor’s appointment and paid back the boss.

The tumor is still there, and my sister keeps telling me if I don’t get it taken care of, it could turn into cancer.  Without a job or insurance, I wonder how she thinks I’m supposed to get that done?

Yes, I’m unemployed again.  The best I’ve ever done at any job has been 3 years, and then one thing or another crops up to end that job.  This time it was a foolhearty decision to return to college for a degree that seemed important at the time but that now has about as much meaning to me or the world as yesterday’s news.

Is it lack of money or lack of confidence that has me in the state I’m in today?

The fact that I can’t, even find a job delivering pizza’s says a lot about the economy, and I know I’m not alone – there are a lot of other people in the same position as me, I’m sure – but, how is this supposed to help me?  Heck, at my age and the shape I’m in, I couldn’t even get a job selling my body for an income.

Is it that I have no money that I have no confidence, or is it the other way around?

I have no friends, so I have no connections.  I have a brother who works for a major airline, but what he sent me in the way of an application is of no use to me since what I’m qualified for never comes up in the search and apply box.  Not that it even matters, since the company website says I am responsible for my own accommodations, transportation, and food in the six-weeks it’ll take them to train me.  Now, how the hell am I supposed to accomplish this when I have no money – which is why I need the job?

Everyone I know is married and secure, either working part-time for something to do, or living stably off their husband’s income in a warm and cozy house somewhere in the ‘burbs, and with animals for children.

I rely on my son for support, and it rips apart my heart a little more each day when I have to ask him for $20 to get by that week.

I also steal the coins my ex collects in Taco Bell cups, and while my daughter always degrades me for it, I say tough-shit, I’m taking it since I need it.

I used to save coins as well – for the poor souls in purgatory.  It used to make me smile and always gave me joy to find pennies on the ground, because I knew it meant someone down there was asking for my help, and I wanted to be the one to ease their suffering.  When the plastic, ziploc bag was filled, I would put it in a box at the back of the church and hope someone will return the favor after I die a lonely, miserable death with no one to even bury my sorry ass, much less pray for the salvation of my tormented soul.  Now, I stare at the half-full bag in my room and contemplate giving in and dumping the lot in a coinstar.  Will doing this be what ultimately sends me to hell, I wonder?

Life has somehow managed to escape me, and long after my last dream has faded into oblivion, leaving me with nothing but despair and tears for a push toward a bleak tomorrow – I have to ask myself why?  What was the point in my being here, aside from bringing two, seemingly stable children into the world?  Was that my life’s goal?  That’s it?  Now I just wait for death to arrive, is that what I’m supposed to do?

If it is money that makes me feel this way, and since I can’t have any – then what?

If my zero self-esteem forces me to become a recluse with no friends and no contact with the outside world for fear of God only knows, then what is the cure?  Where is the frickin’ magic wand, anyway?

Ironically, before I got married, I never had any trouble finding work.  I hardly went through an interview process before I heard the words, “When can you start?”  So, if my life’s goal was to be married and raise children – and that life blew up in my face, leaving me penniless, homeless, and worthless – then what now?  Since I got married, it became more difficult to find a job.  Sure, it’s supposed to be ‘illegal’ to ask about your marital status at an interview, but I know for a fact when they found out I had kids, it was suddenly a waste of my time and theirs, and I never received a call-back.  ONE TIME I did – one time, and three weeks after getting the front-desk receptionist position at a now-defunct company, my little boy ended up in the hospital and I lost that job.

After the divorce, another so-called ‘friend’ asked me to help her with a start-up business she ran out of her house, and since I was eternally grateful to her for offering me a chance to get back on my feet, I dove into that job and did my best to help her out.  Then she let in some Jehovah’s Witnesses and suddenly I was the devil incarnate.  Every day that I went to work, she would lecture me about how wicked I was to be a Catholic, and she challenged me by quoting things I had never heard of before.  Even the look in her once warm, brown eyes suddenly turned vicious, until I couldn’t take it anymore and walked away.  Her live-in boyfriend called me that night for an explanation of what happened, and I spoke honestly, adding that I had nothing against her as a human, and that I would pray for her soul.  He laughed and told me if I ever needed a reference, he was my man.  A month later, he left her and moved to Mexico – so, that reference sailed away on a warm breeze.

Not long after that, I found work at another soon-to-be defunct company, and in the brief, six-months I worked there, I watched a nice, young man being treated inhumanly by his warehouse boss.  I couldn’t understand it, and it moved me every time I heard the old man yelling at the boy about something or other, and if they came up front, the man had no problem calling the boy rude names or cussing beneath his breath, referring to him as incompetent, useless, and a jerk.

Cool thing happened when one day he was asked to replace a fluorescent bulb above my desk, and while he worked, the boss stood nearby yelling at him, telling him he wasn’t doing this or that the right way.  ‘Jim’ fixed the light, and then he hopped off my desk, turned to face the ornery old man, and he shouted, “F. U.!” before he marched out the front door, never to be seen again.  Without waiting for the startled, old man to walk away, I got on the phone with my ex and ‘begged’ him to set up an interview with ‘Jim’, insisting that he and the company he worked for would not be disappointed if they hired him.  I sang ‘Jim’s’ praises until the ex agreed to give him a chance, and ‘Jim’ has been working there ever since.

Then the day came when I needed his help, so I called my ex to ask for ‘Jim’s’ extension, and all I got was the run-around.  I told my ex why I called and needed to speak to ‘Jim’, hoping he could help me locate our old boss so that I could create a resume, but it didn’t matter.  ‘Jim’ wasn’t speaking to me.

So much for one good turn, eh?

According to a story I remember reading way, back in the third grade about the good deeds done on earth turning your heavenly garden into a paradise keep telling me that I have no right to bitch about anything that happens to me, and while I’d like to believe it’s true, it’s not easy to stick to that conviction when faced with the insurmountable pressures I face on a daily basis.  Life isn’t fair, life sucks then you die, and no one said it would be easy, right?

Easy is a bit of a stretch, I think.  How about tolerable, or is that asking too much as well?  Probably.

At that same job, there were two bitches looming over me who did everything they could think of to make me miserable.  I thought by then that I was used to being treated like shit by mindless bitches with nothing better to do than torment people for no, good reason.  Why they gravitate toward me is still a mystery, but my helpful ‘ex’ liked to point out the fact that my personality was such that I ‘asked for it’ a lot of the time.  “Yes, please talk down to me, yell at me in front of others, and order me about like a slave!  Thank you!”  Which is why I still, dont’ get it – but, anyway, I’ve never worked in a place where there wasn’t at least one, fat-hag bitch snarling at me, giving me the evil eye, and jumping at every, last opportunity to publicly humiliate me.  Sure, it’s my fault and my personality dictates that people like that abuse me, because I deserve it since I don’t know why it even happens.

The last job I took was as a courier, and I agreed to use my own vehicle because the boss made it sound heavenly to be able to claim every, last living expense on my taxes, guaranteeing a huge return that spring.  I put over 50,000 miles on my car, went through a set of tires, and countless oil changes (not to mention gas at nearly $4 a gallon) doing that job, driving all over the southeast portion of the state, meeting new people and making a few acquaintances along the way.  Then came tax time, and guess what?  Do I need to tell you that the tax man said I can’t claim anything I saved the receipts for?

At this job, the woman who ‘trained’ me or showed me my ‘route’ had the mistaken impression I was after the boss (which still makes me laugh even now, since he was, like, in his late 60′s at the time and I’m sorry, but WHAT the hell would give you that impression?  Is it that YOU dig him, perhaps?  Gross.  I almost vommed again).  Anyway, she at first kept singing his praises and telling me how happily married he was and how sweet his wife was, until I asked what her problem was, and she literally unleashed, accusing me of everything from marriage destroying to being a whore.  Surprisingly calm, I related to her my own, private hell on account of infidelity and asked why she would think anything as ridiculous as me being that type of a woman, and her reply?  “You smile too much.”

Bitches here, bitches there, bitches, bitches EVERYWHERE!

Am I a loser because I don’t have the money to get in my car and drive to where the work is?  I don’t have the money for gas, and I don’t have the money to stay in a seedy motel (perish forbid I contemplate a ‘h’otel, huh?).  Is it my fault I have no money or a job?  Is it my fault I have no significant other to watch over me, protect me, and make me feel loved or needed?

Religion and money don’t mix any more than they claim religion and politics don’t.  See, I disagree with the latter and wonder about the former.  If you’re supposed to work toward salvation, with despair being a no-no, then … why does not having money throw me into despair?  Why don’t I have any money if I’m not meant to despair?  Why can’t I at least be allowed to deliver pizzas to people who have money to buy the pizza???  I don’t ‘love’ money, so it isn’t a sin that I ‘need’ it in order to survive, right?

Bitch-hags have terrified me out of having the confidence to look for office work, and the economy has left me to wonder if there is anything for me at all in this world.  Religion keeps me from committing suicide, and its religion that prevents me from acting the way everyone else does.  Religion is also the reason why I’m in such despair – so go figure.

Or, is it money?

There is a mahjjong game level I’ve been stuck at for nearly three years now, and to see ‘lose’ over and over again, for that long, gives one a sense of hopelessness, even if it is just a game.  I keep playing the game, and I keep making the same moves or attempting a new strategy, but I continue to lose the game.

Which is a lot like me in real life.  I keep waking up every morning, I continue to breathe and eat, yet I continue to lose the same game over and over again, with no hope in sight, or even to see a glimpse of the proverbial light at the end of the mysterious tunnel.  So, why do I continue to play said game?  What is the point if, after so long, I continue to come up on the losing end?

Does playing both games (Mahjjong and Life) mean that I am not as hopeless or cast out as I think?  Or, could it be naivety in thinking that one day, eventually, things will turn around and at last, I will conquer this stupid game and be able to move on with the rest of whatever it is life and the silly game have to offer?

At this point – I’m not sure I care to find out what happens after that day arrives – nor do I believe that it ever, even will.