Three days into the AC Experiment, I’m sitting in a cozy, well-ventilated room enjoying the fresh evening air flowing through my open windows. My cat seems comfy, too, sprawled along the windowsill, staring at the people mulling in the parking lot of the laundromat across the street. It’s a pleasant night - perfect for open windows even if you have air conditioning.
I was not so content a few hours ago when, upon arriving home from work, my first act was to change as quickly as possible out of my slacks and button-down shirt and into shorts and a wifebeater. Not only were the work clothes restrictive in the early-evening humidity, but the sweat stains they would have acquired would have increased my monthly dry-cleaning expenses, and really, I can’t afford that.
It’s not that bad, really. I just have to suck it up from about 6 to 8 each night, and then the heat dispels.
Still, it would be much easier and more comfortable to buy air-conditioning units and run them throughout the day. It would be much easier to be rich, or at least solvent. Unfortunately for me, frugality trumps convenience at this point in my life.
I miss the days when I could take air conditioning for granted.
Which brings me to the point of this post. I’m not blogging about air conditioning, really, and nor am I writing about the two hours of mild discomfort I’ve endured the past three evenings.
Instead, this post is about the awkward, uncomfortable, rock/hard-place calculations one must make when one is poor. Pay $200 each month for health insurance, or risk a trip to the emergency room. Use your payday loan to buy groceries, or use your payday loan to pay your mortgage. Fix that faulty wiring and get into thousands of dollars of debt, or wait it out and pray your apartment doesn’t burn to the ground.
On a small scale, I made one such decision Sunday night. Forgoing air conditioning, especially during the warmest months of the year, could put me (and my cat) at risk for heat exhaustion or heat stroke, among other scary traumas. When the outside temp tops 90 (or even - gasp! - 100), it will be stifling in my third floor apartment. I will be putting my health at risk.
As a person who grew up privileged, this is new to me, making such decisions. And thinking about the people who have even less - people who live in true poverty, either in the U.S. or abroad - the decisions they must make to ensure their survival must also threaten their well-being and, often, their lives.
As much as I complain about my income, it puts me above the poverty line for a family of five. And that’s without adding in my health benefits. I can’t quite comprehend that.
And with 12.5 percent of Americans living below the poverty line (in 2007, at least. It’s probably higher now), that means many people out there are making decisions far more uncomfortable than I’ll ever have to make (knock on wood).
That is the point of this post: To announce that I’ll be writing an occasional series on the awkward, uncomfortable and sometimes inhumane calculations people must make when they are poor. And I mean truly poor, not just temporarily a bit over their heads, like me.