My boyfriend proposed, and we bought a house. Then, just three weeks after we closed, the market crashed. The house we’d paid $240,000 for was suddenly worth $150,000. It was okay, though — we were still making enough money to cover the exorbitant mortgage payments. Then we weren’t.
This is the story of an educated, white, middle-class couple (both employed in journalism, but that’s a different story) and what happened to them when the rug was snatched out from under.
No, that’s not quite right.
That’s the funny thing about being poor. Everyone has an opinion on it, and everyone feels entitled to share.
It’s about shifting a frame of reference.
We didn’t deserve to be poor, any more than we deserved to be rich. Poverty is a circumstance, not a value judgment.
Go read the entire essay and ask yourself, “What would I have done?”
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Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com