firecat

About providing food for your family when you don't have a lot of money, and the thoughtless advice that people sometimes give if they don't know much about a difficult problem you have, especially if they give the advice using the adverb "just" (with the "it's so simple" connotation).

http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2011/08/31/you-can-just/

Crossposts: http://firecat.livejournal.com/735168.html

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From:

mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com

I am an incredibly frugal grocery shopper. I really do feed my family on an amount that would shock the shit out of most middle class people (It does my mother, who is not exactly a spendthrift, herself). Even so, we spend about 20% more than we would get on food stamps.

I had to go about three weeks without a car in a neighborhood that has an almost adequate bus service. My husband could get to work, we could walk to a small grocery store(whose product section could not rival the one that we could use with a car), and we could pretty much get to where we needed to go during the week. Know what? It still fucking SUCKED, even though we're professional people who were fortunate enough to still be employed with health insurance and such. February in New Hampshire and carless? God, what a pain. It wears you OUT battling the weather just to do your day.

Data points:

I'm self-employed. This means I CAN take a ten minute break to cut up a .99/lb chicken into its component parts and then go back to work.

I have a CAR to get to the grocery store that sells the little bastards.

I have a CAR which means it's realistic to buy six or seven chickens and cut 'em into parts myself.

I'm self-employed, which makes dishes that take watching and soaking time practical because I can start dinner at noon and keep half an eye on it while I'm working during the day.

I have an incredibly well-equipped kitchen. Bread is easy to make with a kitchen aid and a dough hook. Ditto crock pot meals to put in the freezer.

I'm not going it alone. If I'm sick or exhausted, my husband or son can and will cook.

Just being without ONE thing that poor people often don't have that the more well-to-do take for granted was an incredible eye opener for me. If the poor seem "lazy" it's because survival without amenities can wear you the fuck OUT.