You know, if I allowed myself to, I could get very depressed about everything that has not gone well in my life. I did not have an auspicious beginning. My parents were both working class with little formal education. I think they both had a lot of untapped potential to do much better, especially my mother, but they both grew up poor during the Great Depression and the Second World War and being working class and agrarian, respectively, they were not going to be considered as university material no matter their potential. My father with a less than grade nine education fixed cars and fished; my mother with grade eleven or less, raised my brother and me, worked part time as a product demonstrator and following the divorce did whatever she could.
I was reeling from childhood abuse, compounded PTSD, an early introduction to drugs (marijuana and alcohol at fourteen) and fanatical Christianity as a teenage Jesus Freak age fourteen-eighteen. Despite my designation as a gifted child with an IQ in the top two percentile, I was doomed for any academic or professional success.
The chaotic conditions of my adolescence, especially with my parents divorcing each other when I was thirteen, left me depressed, anxious, and clinging to whatever support I could find. There are things that I am not going to divulge here because this blog is for public consumption and discussion and there is information about my life that I consider to be far too delicate and privileged to share openly. In other words, gentle reader, you are simply going to have to ask, fill in the blanks, connect the dots, do the math. Good luck.
I failed grade nine, and with summer school was put in grade ten, which I also technically failed though the principal said he would pass me due to a "clerical error." I did better in my last two years of school, academically, though I finished grade twelve one credit short to graduate. This would make university or college impossible until I was twenty-two, which was just as well. I was too broke for tuition, my grade average too low, and since leaving high school at eighteen I would have to do whatever I could to survive.
My father hated me and would not allow me to stay with him. There is a story here and I am not telling it. My mother had just left her fat studly Romeo boyfriend in another town, returned to the Lower Mainland, and lived in a one bedroom apartment. My single option was to live on my own, find a job and do whatever I could to stay alive. The key word was survival. There were no other relatives interested in offering support by the way. My parent's divorce had alienated us from my father's side of the family (our grandmother disowned us) and my maternal grandparents were already in their eighties and in another province and my mother's many siblings were unavailable, uninterested or unable to help. I will say nothing about my very successful older brother, or his addictions. And, yes, there is a story here and I'm not telling it. Let's just say that we have never been part of each other's lives.
Even though I was born and raised in this city, upon leaving high school, I might as well have been seeking refugee status in a foreign country. I stayed in a shared house with older friends, an absolute dump, found work in a leather factory for minimum wage and found an apartment, two rooms on the top floor of an old house and a shared bathroom. I did not fit well with my co-workers, felt hated by one of the bosses and eventually lost interest in the numbing monotonous work. The quality of my work began to slip. I was told to improve or leave. I left.
It was November 14, 1974. I had worked at that place for nearly four months. I was eighteen years old and able to collect unemployment (now employment) insurance. My father did help me with some survival money while waiting for my claim to be processed. Living with him was out of the question. In December I worked for about a week at the post office, but spent the next several months doing nothing but enjoying long walks and reading in cafes and enjoying time with friends. Employment insurance was very easy in those days, Unemployment Enjoyment.
In the spring and summer I put my hand at various temporary jobs, extending my insurance claim then went to Toronto where I worked in the hospitality industry before returning to Vancouver six months later. I stayed in various shared arrangements while trying to survive from job to job. For some reason it was always difficult to persuade an employer to hire me. There were more huge disruptions that occurred that I will not go into here. I did manage to stay employed long enough to save money for tuition, with help from Canada Student Loan and (obligatory, otherwise he would not have ponied up) help from my father.
The rest of my life from there involved low-wage employment and no money or energy left for continuing education. My thirteen year nightmare, which could provide material for ten Stephen King novels, began in 1986 and by its end in 1999 I was seriously ill with PTSD, worse than ever. It has been a long and hard task rebuilding my life but it is being rebuilt. If it wasn't for affordable housing I would not be able to make it. My lack of university education and marketable skills has left me stranded in low-wage work, but at least I can make ends meet now, have money in the bank and travel.
Everything has turned out pretty good. I have no family, but some friends, work that I enjoy and a decent place to live. I am nearing retirement age and of course thinking of retirement, which likely will have to be delayed for some time if I want to survive with a modicum of dignity.
Had there been services and supports available to me that would have enabled me to live somewhere decent while getting on with my education and later with a career then I imagine things would have turned out differently. The system as it is is dysfunctional and serves primarily the interests of the wealthy. This has to change or there is going to be no change at all, only for the worse.
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