Transportation Charge Adrenalin Assignment
The Easy Labor van finally came after we’d been waiting for an hour and fifteen minutes. None of us said anything. We hopped in,
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went back to the office, and collected our money.
All $14 of it. That’s right, $14. The $24 I had earned was whittled
away by taxes and fees, plus the $5 transportation charge, which brought me down to $14. It was almost 4:00 and I had been out of the shelter since before 7:30, and $14 was all I had to show for it. I was infuriated, pissed, steam venting from my ears, but I didn’t show it. Even with the Adrenalin still pumping through my veins, I decided that one stand was enough for the day. Nevertheless, $14 made me question my notion that any work was better than no work.
Omar had been working for Easy Labor on a job around the corner, so I waited a half hour for him to get back to collect his loot, which ended up being three times my earnings. We walked down King Street to Marion Square, where college-aged kids were tossing Frisbees and footballs and laying out on the freshly cut green grass, soaking in the sun’s rays. Older couples were walking their dogs. We admired the atmosphere right before us from which we were so far removed. We were homeless. Bums. We could sit and watch, but that’s where the line was drawn. We couldn’t afford to woo any of those women, and even if we decided to splurge our money, we certainly weren’t afforded the flexibility to take them back to our place for a nightcap. Can you imagine that conversation? “Hey, fellas, this is my friend Jennifer. She’s a student at the College of Charleston. Real sweet girl, majoring in, uh, Aeronautical Biochemistry or something exciting like that. A little too short and slim for my taste, but I’m not picky. I’ll take what I can get for now. Anyway, um, she’s gonna be sharing my mattress with me tonight.” We were window shoppers. Look, but don’t touch. Single and unfit to mingle. The few feet between them and us might as well have been miles. They were well out of our league.
But, if nothing else, that gave us hope and aspiration and something to look forward to. For some reason, there was something magical about sitting there by the fountain with a mere $50 between me and broke. Watching everybody else running and giggling and prospering,
SCRATCH BEGINNINGS
Omar and I knew that that was where we wanted to be. And we knew what we had to do.
“Roommates,” Omar said. “We need to be roommates. That’s how we’re gonna get out of this lifestyle. We gotta do it together.”
And I couldn’t have agreed more. Together. We sketched a plan that would have us out of the shelter and into the projects in two months. “I know where we can get a place to stay for four hundred dollars a month,” he said. “It ain’t a pretty neighborhood, but it’s better than the shelter.”
I was a bit skeptical about residing in the ghettos of Charleston, but that was a mere technicality that we could work out later. Right now, we had a master plan on getting out.
We walked back up Meeting Street en route to the shelter. We picked up our pace as we walked through “Chicken Row,” the assortment of Piggly Wiggly, KFC, and Church’s Chicken where the delicious aroma of fried chicken wafting out of the buildings’ front doors made it difficult not to dip into our pockets for a three-piece dinner with mashed potatoes, a buttermilk biscuit, and sweet tea for just $4.19. Whew, that was tough walking through there. But we couldn’t spend our money. As much of a fiend as I was for fried chicken, a few dollars here and a few dollars there would hurt me. We had to save. Besides, dinner at the shelter was right around the corner.
But really, saving wasn’t that difficult for me since there wasn’t much I needed to spend my money on. I would have to keep myself clothed, and I would need to spring for bus fare when it came time for me to get around town to places that weren’t within walking distance. Until I got a real job, I would survive on my staple lunch of crackers and sausage, but even when I was employed full-time, I would be careful with how I spent my money. While I absolutely believed in rewarding myself from time to time for the hard work that I was putting in, I had to remain within reason. I had to delay gratification.
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And that was the name of the game. Delaying gratification. In my mind, I had to be prepared to put my wants aside indefinitely as I fought to attain basic needs. I didn’t yet have the means to provide my own food, shelter, clothing, or an automobile. Nothing. So the more money I spent on booze or cigarettes or snacks or the latest pair of shoes that nobody else on the block had yet, the farther I would be from accomplishing what I had set out to accomplish. To me, money that wasn’t saved or going toward other worthy means was money wasted.
Which didn’t mean I was setting myself up to be a robot that worked hard all day and penny-pinched my entire paycheck. No, no. An occasional stop at KFC or trip to the movies wasn’t going to break the bank as long as I understood that I was on a mission. I knew where I wanted to be, and I wanted to get there as soon as possible.
I loved the hours at the shelter. In and out early meant that I would stay focused on what I needed to be doing and that I would have a better shot at staying out of trouble and out of harm’s way.
On the weekends, attendance was down at the shelter as a lot of the guys hit the social circuit, renting hotel rooms or staying with friends. But not me. Weekends meant I would have my choice of where to sleep, all the shower time I needed, and enough food to fill me up until Monday.
Before check-in, Larry searched me out to relay his elation that he had just scored a permanent job through Charleston.net. He wasn’t terribly excited about being a garbage man, but he was excited about the guaranteed forty hours a week that came with having a job with f
To a certain extent, I liked his attitude. He wanted out, and he had a plan, whereas a great number of people didn’t and were freeloading at the shelter off of the generosity of donations and grants and government dollars that were attained through a rigorous and competitive application process. Larry wasn’t a freeloader, but I was still a bit disappointed.
I wasn’t disappointed that his math was off. He was somewhat savvy, but on his salary with a host of other expenses like electricity, food, transportation, and entertainment, it wasn’t going to be easy for him to live in a place that cost $650.
I was disappointed, however, that he obviously hadn’t paid attention during his orientation with Ms. Evelyn. She had explained quite clearly that many people land themselves in the shelter or end up returning to the shelter as a result of defective budgeting techniques. “Your rent should not exceed one-third of your monthly salary,” she had said. Several times. Weren’t poor financial decisions a major reason that a lot of people were ending up at the shelter in the first place?
Despite my reservations, Larry was set on moving out the next week. He wasn’t interested in hearing what I had to say about finding a place that was cheaper and maybe even getting a roommate. He didn’t even want to listen when I told him that the second bedroom
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he required to house the drum set he was going to buy was just not a feasible option. He had his mind made up, so I had to let the issue lay to rest.
Outside the shelter before check-in was always the most entertaining time of the night. At about 7:15 every night, Sergeant Mendoza, known outside the shelter walls by his full name, “Hidethatshit Sargeiscoming,” would walk through the shelter yard searching for open containers of alcohol hidden behind benches and book bags. At least three times a week, he would catch a newcomer who had not been forewarned about the secret searches, and he would take him to jail, where he was processed and returned back to the shelter by nine, all the while cursing the Wrath of Sarge. It was routine, but it kept the shelter residents honest. As much as we could say that we hated his serious demeanor and ball-busting tactics, we all knew that Sarge was the lifeblood of the shelter. Some might try to say we were safe because the doors to the general population area of the shelter were locked on both sides, but the truth is that Sarge was our security. Few dared to step out of line, and he nailed them if they did.
The freedom to shower as long as I wanted on Saturday night gave me an opportunity to do laundry for the first time, a system that the ever-so prudent Easy E had introduced me to the night before. Instead of spending several dollars per load plus the cost of detergent, he showed me how I could use my regular bar of soap to clean my clothes in the shower and where I could hang them each night so that they would be dry by the time I woke up the next morning. Since I didn’t plan on having more than a few changes of clothes anyway, it was the most sensible option. I could wash my clothes in the shower at night and by the next day they would be ready to wear again. Even though a washer and dryer could have done a more thorough job on stains, I saved many dollars using Easy E’s system for a majority of my time in the shelter.
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With evident ulterior motive, Larry invited me to sleep next to him in a spot left vacant by one of the guys who was spending the weekend away from the shelter. I declined his offer. I was in a funk, dissatisfied with my day. My first Saturday had left a bad taste in my mouth. True, my clothes were clean, and I was well fed, but I’d invested nearly my whole day to earn $14, and that felt like such a waste.
But I suppose sometimes you just have to toss those feelings to the side and look forward to the next day. And I was really looking forward to my first Sunday working downtown with George, the guy I had met at the construction site on Friday.
Answer the following 2 questions from the above article.
- Question 1 Why was Adam so optimistic that he would achieve his American dream on the night he got his first job?
- Question 2 Do you think Adam was smart in the way he chose to balance his new job at Fast Company and his social life?