There has been so much that I have gone through so far this year. Most of it has been for the good, but then the ugliness part of life creeps in. The wrong people, wrong choices you make. I had gotten so attached to Facebook that I started to neglect what the real world was like and had to offer. Then I started to go see what was really out there. Here I was, living in a new state alone, with not a support system in sight. The friend that I thought I had started to change and then I was out on my own. I had decided to move down south to get a better life or so I thought. It wasn't Delaware, so I thought that I was good. Delaware just seemed to close in on me like four walls and I'm sitting in a nut house. It seemed that everyone and everything never changed. Poverty existed all around me, and people felt that they had to live in it, bathe in it, and get comfortable to the reality to not live, just exist. It was May of 2011, and there I was in my cap and gown graduating with my Bachelor's degree. I felt proud being the only one in my family to graduate while it was my family to tell me that I wasn't going to amount to anything because they hadn't. I had no choice but to keep pressing forward. That day I got my Bachelor's I felt like I was on top of the world. But, then I thought, wait, I'm the only one here, this isn't fun! Then, I decided to make a change and move down south. I mean sure it was the right thing to do. I was depressed. The family that I had was on drugs or seemed non existent in my little world. My dreams didn't matter, and if they did, they still didn't matter to anyone else because my dreams didn't incorporate in their world, their life. Oh well. I was determined to be the best me that I could be and I thought, " Hmph, I'll show them!" Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. BAM!!! I was alone in a new state, no friend, no family or any that cared anyway. It was just me. But, I could handle it, I was used to being alone anyway, right? I had lived on my own before, so it was a piece of cake. You see, in life we have to do what we have to and not what we want to at times. Hey, it's okay. I had my big girl panties on. Luckily, I had saved my own from school and work and was able to live for about eight months. As time progressed money was getting less and less. I did what any other person would do, hit the pavement and search for jobs. All I kept thinking was, " Don't call daddy for help, you can do this!" I went to sign up for food stamps and medical. Sitting in the waiting room, I looked around at the men who looked homeless, the women with three kids or more waiting for their number to be called. Prior to getting in the situation I was in, I had gotten hired for a job. When I got here down south, they hired someone else for the job. I thought, " FUCK!!!!" I'm sitting in the waiting area to be called. Reading a book by Neil Gamen, trying to concentrate listening to the crying kids, undriven men sit there waiting to pick up their check, I thought, " What the hell am I doing here?" A tear shed from my eye as I turned the page. Then my number was called. I jumped up with what ounce of hope I had left and I proceeded to be interviewed for food stamps and medicaid. I smiled, shook my hand to the worker. She looked over all of the paper work and began shaking her head. Then she said,
" Miss. Diggs?"
" Yes." I replied.
" I'm sorry but since you are single with no children and aren't on disability you won't be eligible to medical or food stamps."
My heart had sunk down to the floor.
" Come again?" I responded.
She went on to repeat herself. Then I cut in..
" Ma'am, so you are telling me that I need to have a child in order to receive help?"
She rolled her eyes at me and said,
" Yes, ma'am that is correct."
It took every ounce of me not to cry.
" Hm mm, so you're saying I need to go out here get knocked up, break a leg, then come back with a belly and limping for you to give me $200 a month for food and card for me to go to the doctor?"
She didn't have a response and then she said,
" I can give you a bag of ramen noodle and some spam."
I looked at her stood up, shook her hand, and left.
On my way out of the building, I see a woman pregnant with a child with four more sitting next to her. I went back to my house and just sat on my carpet in a daze. I didn't have any furniture, bed, or cable. What I had was my clothes, electric and some food. I was determined to make things work, I then got on my computer and applied for jobs like crazy and began writing another book. It helped, then I signed up for graduate school. I started going and the first semester I got a refund check for $4000. Talk about God working in mysterious ways.
To read Part two of "The Move" be back here next week!
