Dept of Public social Services, 5th hour. Suddenly I cry. Don't know why, or do I know why? My bladder infection has worsened through the standing and sitting, the waiting waiting waiting. No assurance AT ALL that there will be a single cent for our dinner tonight. But HOW I long to be sitting in that booth with each child of mine! past this, able to pay, just for tonight well all right, but just. To be there and alive. It is the children that make this place a little more bearable; and the toilets work.

What it is, though, is despair. It's the blank despair of hardship that has prevailed for so long the people forget, or never knew, that life does also happen without it. A despair so fully entrenched within a person that the person forgot that there is real, biting PAIN attached to it.

And I am raw: this despair is just coming into me, crowding me, it makes me hurt and I am not inured.

I feel the pain, the despair, and it seems the world will not rest til I am one of these lifeless grunts, so accustomed to despair that I no longer recognize the pain.

And then no tears. Not for the rent, the bills, the baby, the job, nada. Just hanging out in some shithole

[unfinished]

03-15-96

At the Comfort Inn - Rory will not sleep!

Good? News: 1 interview at TRW, and I met one woman and the next, which is a good sign I think. But #2 is very non-committal, which is a bad sign I think.

L.A. Times, faxes, faxes, faxes - muthafukkas work. Both of the (good!) interviews I went on today were the result of faxes sent last week. Though there must be no china eggs, my hopes are just too high on both positions.

The first, which pays only $8/hr (but more over time) is administrative assistant to the other wise Association - the fledgling and to-be-official sanctioning body for professional other wise. The office is run by 2 young and lovely men __ and his #2 man, __. I would be #3 in a business that is exploding more than growing - they are putting on competitions all over the world this year, covered by ESPN and ESPN2. I would handle memberships, phone, manage a database, and over time could likely be designing promotional materials and possibly even writing copy! SUPER exciting.

The second is a Sunset Boulevard doctor who is very energetic, very busy and very creative and focused. He is making his name with innovative practices treating a variety of ailments, some of which resulted from accidents, others not. He is an expert witness and is very keen to pursue the legal aspects of his work. His patients are provided with a book following what appears to be an exhaustive examination; it is a 3-ring notebook tabbed with an explanation of the diagnostic techniques, a diagnosis and proposed course of treatment, a bill and proposed full cost sheet, a personal note, etc. The text is quite dry and rendered in Ariel with nothing fancier than a border on each page. He wants to incorporate graphics and otherwise make the presentation more eye-pleasing. I think I could help him: at the interview I only came up with fonts, but afterward I thought, columns. I fantasized getting the job and actually being empowered enough within the position to say to him, "You don't just want it to look good - you want it to be read" - and thereby being able to actually contribute creatively, WRITING!

WOULD IT BE A GAS OR WHAT!?

---- is the very first prospective employer who actually chose to interview me because of my English degree - and he even said, if this does not happen (my typing speed is too slow) that there is a book he wants to write and I might be just the person to help him get the project off the ground. Both writing and desktop publishing - really doing!! He asked me, based on what he had told me about the position, what I thought it would pay, and I said 25-30 thousand. Then he said what would you accept the job for? and I said to start, $23,000. I asked was that in their ballpark (his bookkeeper was present by this time) and they said YES. Hope I didn't go too low. It would be salary, and I would be expected to stay late when necessary and take the time back later. At the ASA there is a chance of OT.

23000 is about 442.³¹/week: 11.06+ an hour. Think I went too low?! 25000 is just about 12. 30000 is 14.⁴²+.

So - if I was to get a job @ 15⁰⁰/hr, it would equal 31,200 annually.

But have I ever given up on that! 8⁰⁰/hr is less than 20,000. But way, way more than nothing.

I also interviewed yesterday for a part-time job making all of 7.⁵⁰/hour! 28½ hrs/wk = 213⁷⁵; that is less than I got from unemployment.

BUT: unemployment is gone and all the income so far this month consists of the $192 I got from the state today. I have to go on welfare, a nightmare of unknown proportion.

Because they take your spirit in exchange for the crumbs of survival tossed your way. They dehumanize, belittle, degrade. They clutch at any fucking pretext to induce you to sign a paper declaring that you are withdrawing your application for AFDC. They frustrate you to the end of your endurance. I went a week ago Wednesday - only found out Tuesday 03-05-96 that my unemployment benefits ceased the day I completed school - and waited seven hours in that hell 2 of them standing outside in the wrong fucking line! - only to be calmly informed that I made too much money because I couldn't prove I did not still collect unemployment.

I lost it. It was Wednesday, the night I'm supposed to take my kids to dinner. I had $2 - $3 on me. A bladder infection. For the last 2 hours or so I sat in a classroom-like room and listened while the woman went after every applicant, looking here, there, anywhere to get them to withdraw their application.

I saw such injustice. Then I was the very last applicant of the day - because when I was told to fill out the papers and return the next day, I busted up and cried (as I had been doing constantly since finding out the necessity of doing welfare) and the man took pity.

And this woman - who looks white, talks black, and has apparently become inured to the hardship and despair she must witness every day - had left the room. Her colleague was getting a woman who just had her sister's 3 children dropped in her lap (doubling the size of the household) to withdraw her application and was nearly done and though she no doubt shared the 1^st woman's agenda, she seemed kinder. I was sighing with relief because I would be talking to her when woman #1 returned and called me to her desk.

Christ I cannot go on right now. But I believe I know what separates me from the other manless mothers there, what will save Rory from the sad fate of the other fatherless children.

Brok had dumped me the night before - the day I found out that I no longer had even a pisspoor income, but none. He came to the Hangar; we played a game. I had asked him on the phone to spend the night and been refused; I had called 2 to 5 times without a response. I was buzzed and asked again and when he said Don't you listen? I said I just want to know what I did to get on your shit-list and then he said, "I'm with someone." I felt SO sad. I said, "That's what I needed to know." And the next part of the exchange I forget, but Brok asked me why it had to be "all or nothing" and I said, "You're with her, that's all, and you're not with me, that's nothing. It's what it is because it's what it is, not because I need for it to be." And he has not been seen by me til tonight. I have a pajama top from Betty's; he has a book of hers. He came here where Rory and I are. He said, "You look fine," and had the mysterious fond look again. Left the shirt and a bottle of Schnapps and promised to return.

It's 2:30 and counting. I am all out of paper unless I go to the car and am not sure about leaving Rory alone.

But I should, I guess - get paper and my sister's present.