First job out of college (part 5)

When I had free time, I went out to the local skatepark to learn new tricks and improve old ones. During the week, I lifted weights to keep getting stronger. When I wasn’t doing that, I still played some video games and watched videos on the internet. It was far from luxury however it was cheap and affordable. It was very much the same lifestyle I had in my college days. This way of life paid off. By the end of 2010, I had saved up a total of $8000 in my bank account.

By the time December arrived, I had already completed my classes for tax preparation. I passed the exams and did well in the interviews unfortunately I lost my interest and ambition to pursue the career path. Already, I was working a full time job so they only time I could really dedicate to tax prep was on the weekends and that was completely out of the question for me. I remembered December being a terrible month at work. Being that Christmas was coming up, a lot of the volunteers were depending on the money to buy gifts for their children. This led to a lot of anger and frustration being directed to me and I remember one occasion where a program director told me that I ruined a family’s Christmas. Had I not needed the job, I would have gladly told the woman that her and her family can eat dog food for all I care. It was very easy to lose my humanity but I really did start to develop a hatred for these people and the poor in general. Constantly, I wanted to tell these people that they shouldn’t have had children that they couldn’t afford. Call me a monster or an inhuman jerk but I don’t care. I just remember being hassled on all ends. Being pulled in all different directions and yelled at by everyone made it feel like I had just voided my bowels and all I had to clean myself with was sandpaper.

The other analysts did have some similar opinions. After all, the people that we were serving had very similar characteristics. We could tell because we were required to look through their tax returns, EBT statements, welfare payments, child birth certificates, and child support payments. Volunteers in this government program could only qualify for the child care benefit if they were in a certain income bracket. These people were very poor. Usually they earned $20,000 a year or less and had at least two children. I would say that at least 95% of the members were single moms that were either divorced or more likely never married. I kept on thinking that these people wouldn’t be poor and destitute if they just made sure not to have children. Children aren’t cheap and I knew for sure that childcare was expensive because I had to look at the schedule of fees for hundreds of child care providers. In a licensed day care center, it is reasonable to pay at least $20 an hour just to keep the child there. Of all the states, California seemed to be one of the most expensive states as I remember sending child care providers in California payments that ranged from $500 to over $1000 per month. With as expensive as California is, I would never want to live there let alone raise a child there.