My personal life/job journey
My childhood is such a weird mix of occasional poverty, incredible racism, and more.
Like, we were on welfare/food stamps a few times. And my father is a high school drop out and ex-felon. He literally had to lie to get jobs where he made roughly $10/hour.
But my dad would work 10 hours a day, 6 days a week. We did well enough. My sister and I went to private school. My parents owned a house with a cheap swimming pool in Cleveland, OH.
racism, money, childhood
We probably could have lived a higher class lifestyle if my father wasn't so racist that he refused to let my sister and I go to what he called the "bad black public schools." So we went to private school, instead.
My parents couldn't really afford to send me to college at all. That's not a thing they could afford. So instead, my sister did not go to college initially and instead worked as a bank teller like my Mom.
racism, money, childhood
Me... I barely managed to go to college, thanks to obtaining enough scholarships to get a full ride to a relatively local Jesuit college called John Carroll University. Technically, it was *almost* a full ride. I still had some loans, but nothing like most folks.
When I got out of college, I was severely underemployed, basically making the equivalent of $12/hour for a software job.
money, childhood
And now here I am making an order of magnitude more than that at age 40. I support 4 other queer folks living in my house that have been unemployed or underemployed the entire time they've been here.
I own an airplane and am building a house. I'm doing really well in this capitalism game.
money, childhood
You are an absolute inspiration! Taking care of your chosen family is the best way to stick it to the system and status quo
money, childhood
Sure, and it's really cool that you're giving credit where it's due, but a lot of people have privileges like that and don't take time to appreciate it and to avoid taking any of it for granted :)
money, childhood
@baronnarcveldt Thanks. As I talk about here, a lot of it is luck and privilege. I also presumably benefited from my father's racism by him using what money we had to send me to private schools. IDK.