Oral History (Marlaine, 48)

Marlaine is a 48 year old women, mother to three children, and lives in the suburbs outside Chicago. She divorced officially in October 2007, after a long fight for it. It wasn’t an easy divorce, a kind that no one particularly wants. She is working two jobs to just barely get by due to lack of child support. “I work two jobs and it’s still not enough to live comfortably.” Everyone knows working two jobs is a difficult task; especially adding in all the everyday things, maintaining a house, sleep, eat, time to relax. “I don’t have time to really relax; I just have time for a 7 hour night’s sleep. Sometimes I have to get up at four in the morning for one of my jobs.” Finding time to relax in the mix of getting divorced would be hard enough, but that’s not where it ended. “After the divorce I still had to go to court to try and get child support from him.” There isn’t any time to break away from this type of thing. It’s nonstop, for years. “It’s been a hard fight for child support. He’s been sent to jail for going against court orders; his bail was $4,000, what he owed at the time for child support.” All of this time out of work to try and get a little bit of support, women in this position has no other choice other than to keep fighting it and working extremely hard. Working on unfair salaries, but don’t quit because they can’t find anything else. “Well, my first job is a customer service job; I make $13.20 an hour. Last year I made only $26,000. With the second job working part time at Kohls I only made an extra $3,600.” That really isn’t a lot of money; I could see not living well off that. When you have a lot of things to do and no money; I’m sure many people these days are experiencing a money struggle. So, many can imagine once you add multiple court dates taking up your time makes it more difficult. “I use my vacation days for the days I have to go to court, but I run out quickly” Once the paid for vacation days run out, what are people suppose to do? They have to lose money in order to try and get money, probably get a second job to pick up the slack. The second job starts working as more than picking up the slack though; it’s a necessity in order to maintain everything. It still won’t be enough, but a third job isn’t possible. “I work 40 hours a week at one place and 10-15 at the other. I just have enough time to eat dinner in-between on Monday and Wednesdays.” Barely having time to eat is tough. It gets to someone mentally and adds on the stress. “It takes a toll on you, especially frustration because it’s like dealing with a child.” It’s really hard to succeed in getting something like child support if it’s not another mature person on the other side. Some are easier than others. Having to send someone to jail in order to receive some money is bit extreme, and you can just imagine the intensity. “The way the court see’s it is that he doesn’t have a job. Really, he is self employed, so it’s not like they can garnish his wages or anything.” Self employment is a difficult thing because if the other person is lying, which they shouldn’t be doing, but do anyway, there isn’t exactly a way to track their employment. “The government isn’t fair, without a question. They don’t know the whole truth all the time. It’s a vicious circle.” It really is a circle, go into court to get child support, they believe the person, give them a time frame, it doesn’t go through, go back to court, and all the same stuff over and over again for years. “He now owes a little over $9,000.” It would make sense logically to get a new job instead of working two jobs. It’s not that easy to find a new job without a college degree. Employers assuming people who didn’t go to college aren’t capable. “College wasn’t as big of a deal then as it is now.” People who grew up with college not being praised upon as a necessity have a more difficult finding a job, even if they are qualified. “I’ve learned a lot of programs on the computer and have the ability to learn whatever I need to, but employers don’t see that, they see no college on your papers.” Is college being too praised upon these days? It might be shutting down on people true abilities. Today’s society makes it appear that you are stupid if you don’t go to college. Talking to this woman, she is very smart and is just as qualified as someone who has gone to college. “I’ve worked with the costumer service company for over ten years, I only moved up to customer service about 3 years ago.” There is clearly experience there, but people are too focused on college or not. What happen to looking at work ethic and dedication? “It’s hard to work two jobs and maintain a normal life, but I don’t have another choice.” Many people are in this position. There isn’t another choice, but to keep living their stressful lives fighting to just get by. When will these people matter and others care to help?