> Quoting Chuck0 <chuck at mutualaid.org>:
>
>
>>I spent part of my afternoon calming down a sister who is unemployed and
>>was in hysterics about "giving up on everything." The trigger today was
>>being rejected from a $200 ragweed guinea pig study for medical reasons.
>
>
> My own experience is, it's always the little things which drive you nuts when
> you're unemployed. I think it's a self-defense mechanism: the brain shuts
> down when confronted with really big things, like monster bills and spiraling
> credit card payments. Or at least mine does. But then some little thing will
> happen and all the repressed negativity erupts.
Yep, that's been my experience. One of the interesting discoveries I've made about being poor is how angry one gets. The violent thoughts are very entertaining--I try to channel mine into thoughts of disemboweling spammers and right wingers. Another interesting discovery, which a homeless activist my age confirmed for me, is that one tends to get more radical with age if you are already a radical. One of the myths about the black bloc, for example, is that when it gets rowdy, it's all the youngsters. Actually, it's the older anarchists who are the feisty ones. After years of being fucked over by the system, paying bills and rent, wasting away in some cubicle, it become very easy to start breaking stuff and throwing rocks.
For me, the hardest part about unemployment is trying to go to sleep. I've never been one to have insomnia, but you can manage to stay busy all day and then you go to bed and everything hits you.
Chuck0