Being Poor: Why it's awesome and I am thankful for it

[DanielleNguyen]

It's no secret I grew up poor and proud of it. I think growing up the way I did set me apart from the other girls I grew up with. I had tears in my jeans and holes in my shoes. My hair was always pulled up in a messy pony tail and I never had the fancy beautiful baby dolls like the other girls. They were always pretending to be mommys and I was carrying my stick on the playground fighting imaginary soldiers. i always pretended to be a Amazon princess like Xena. I remember when the girls would wear new clothes and have pretty necklaces and at a young age it became a competition of who was prettier and who had nicer things.
Because I was poor I didn't have those things. I carried a air freshener around my neck. I was young it had a diamond on the end. I thought it was a necklace anyway moving on. I pretended that the necklace once I held it into the air transformed me into a beautiful warrior with pigtails. I also forgot to mention I was a fan girl of Sailor moon.
Now a days, as a adult I still see the people trying to outdo one another with who has more and I laugh because I will never like that. Growing up I learned to make things and I am thankful for that. I make clothes, lotions, Jewelry, and soaps. I may seem odd to others but b/c of how I was raised I see things differently.

If something is torn then sew it and fix it. There is no greater pride then looking back at your work and seeing what a well job you did and if you messed up laughing at it. I don't need the fanciest phone or clothes because growing up with so little you learn to love so little.

I remember when I first met Duc. He had given me a charm bracelet. People said it had cost him only 5 dollars at most and while people made fun of it I cherished it. The bracelet now is turning orange and the silver isn't as bright. However I still wear that bracelet.

Being poor, having so little makes you in my opinion better than those who have everything. You become a hard worker and sentimental. You become a great mother because you can't afford a sitter 24/7. And the values you learn in life you tend to pass on to your kids.
Life now a days is hard people look at you odd if you dress different or don't have as much as them. But through this you learn to keep your head up high. So much pride in being poor.

Back through the years
I go wonderin once again
Back to the seasons of my youth
I recall a box of rags that someone gave us
And how my momma put the rags to use
There were rags of many colors
Every piece was small
And I didn't have a coat
And it was way down in the fall
Momma sewed the rags together
Sewin every piece with love
She made my coat of many colors
That I was so proud of
As she sewed, she told a story
From the bible, she had read
About a coat of many colors
Joseph wore and then she said
Perhaps this coat will bring you
Good luck and happiness
And I just couldnt wait to wear it
And momma blessed it with a kiss
Chorus:

My coat of many colors
That my momma made for me
Made only from rags
But I wore it so proudly
Although we had no money
I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me

So with patches on my britches
Holes in both my shoes
In my coat of many colors
I hurried off to school
Just to find the others laughing
And making fun of me
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me

And oh I couldnt understand it
For I felt I was rich
And I told them of the love
My momma sewed in every stitch
And I told em all the story
Momma told me while she sewed
And how my coat of many colors
Was worth more than all their clothes

But they didn't understand it
And I tried to make them see
That one is only poor
Only if they choose to be
Now I know we had no money
But I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
Made just for me.



(picture of me, husband, and baby. )

[zboy1]

Nice looking family, DanielleNguyen! You're not as ugly as you say you are either, Danielle. I think you are very underrating yourself.

Anyway, yes, I, too grew up in a poor to barely middle-class life up to my teen years, and I can say, I'd rather have been born wealthy than poor. But having said that...maybe that's why I'm not your typical low-life, jerk American male. It does humble you--growing-up poor, definitely. The opposite usually occurs when you grow-up rich: spoiled and nasty, usually...

[DanielleNguyen]

exactly...

[Winston]

Is this you Danielle? Wow you look very sweet and innocent, like a foreign woman. lol

[Winston]

Btw Danielle, can you please stop using all caps in the threads of your titles? That's considered shouting and is loud. I've already fixed the caps in your last few threads.

Does your husband know about this forum? Has he seen it? You should tell him that it's the most freethinking forum and started by an Asian bro.

[ladislav]

It's OK for a woman to be poor in the US. It sucks being a poor boy/man

[gsjackson]

Nice looking family, DanielleNguyen! You're not as ugly as you say you are either, Danielle. I think you are very underrating yourself.

Agreed. Great face.

[zacb]

If it were not for getting out and the issues with the government, I could care less. But because of the government, I need to get some assets so i can get out of here.

[nicho12]

It's OK for a woman to be poor in the US. It sucks being a poor boy/man

You hit the nail on the head, being a poor man in the US is like a death sentence, to make it worse, if you're not good looking by American women's standards

[SilverEnergy]

You might be able to say that now but when the market crashes and all fiat currency around the world fails, you won't be saying that.

[djfourmoney]

It's OK for a woman to be poor in the US. It sucks being a poor boy/man

Of course it sucks. Only fat b*tches/ugly/with child will go anywhere near you if your broke because you are their last hope of a steady supply of dick and doubling of her buying power assuming your not unemployed as well.

What I see on the bus everyday is immigrants, poor but with children, smiling. Sure there are challenges but overall both parents are holding the hand of their children.

At times I don't quite understand the complaining about Mexican and Central American immigrants. Sure there are bad apples, but White Americans don't want to be grouped in with the racist and bigots among them, so please don't be a hypocrite.

I'm also tired of Black America basically saying they have no dog in the immigration battle and are in fact at odds with Latin Americans as they increasingly move into "their" communities, listen to "their music" and behave similarly.

I grew up Middle Class a rarity for Black America as a whole and I am not in competition with anybody, unless it actually is competition, like racing

I am officially poor however, I have earned unofficially of course about $5,000 since I started donating plasma + GR. This isn't taxable income, if it was I would have qualified for unemployment and maybe could have done more of what I have planned.

But I am going in another direction...

[publicduende]

I think the statement that being a poor man is worse than being a poor woman is out of place.

What I believe Danielle meant is that growing in a rural, lower middle class environment gave her a deeper and more meaningful attachment to the things she owned and cherished, as well as making her far more aware of the value of immaterial gifts: simplicity and kindness, creativity, and ultimately love. The same values continue to inform her life to the present moment, where she find herself being a wife and a mom.

Danielle, from your posts I would say you're a wonderful person before being a good woman and (I am sure) a great mom. Your posts resonate of a spirit and a quality that I thought I could never read on this forum. The (relative) hardship you went through earlier in your life definitely made you a better person. A minor miracle, if you ask me, as it's much more common to come out the other end of the tunnel as a cynical, money-hungry person whose only objective is catch up for all they had lacked.

You make me wish all women of our generation (25-40), American and not, were like you.

And yes, you have a beautifully clean face and smile. Your Duc really is a lucky man to have you by his side.

[skateboardstephen]

It's OK for a woman to be poor in the US. It sucks being a poor boy/man

Of course it sucks. Only fat b*tches/ugly/with child will go anywhere near you if your broke because you are their last hope of a steady supply of dick and doubling of her buying power assuming your not unemployed as well.

What I see on the bus everyday is immigrants, poor but with children, smiling. Sure there are challenges but overall both parents are holding the hand of their children.

At times I don't quite understand the complaining about Mexican and Central American immigrants. Sure there are bad apples, but White Americans don't want to be grouped in with the racist and bigots among them, so please don't be a hypocrite.

I'm also tired of Black America basically saying they have no dog in the immigration battle and are in fact at odds with Latin Americans as they increasingly move into "their" communities, listen to "their music" and behave similarly.

I grew up Middle Class a rarity for Black America as a whole and I am not in competition with anybody, unless it actually is competition, like racing

I am officially poor however, I have earned unofficially of course about $5,000 since I started donating plasma + GR. This isn't taxable income, if it was I would have qualified for unemployment and maybe could have done more of what I have planned.

But I am going in another direction...

Any Black American that supports illegal immigration to the U.S. is not very smart..Black Americans are at odds with Latinos,especially Mexicans.Mexicans do not like Blacks,They don't want to align themselves with Blacks nor work with Blacks.I have seen Dominicans pretty much have taken over Philadelphia,a Black city.In Philadelphia i felt like a foreigner in a city i was born in.I speak Spanish so i hear and ear full of shit talking about Blacks when they think no one understands them.They only hire their own people yet have monopolies in Black neighborhoods.You have job adds that say "bilingual only" yet if you apply you don't get the job..so this may as well just say "Hispanic only".Jobs that teenagers used to do(like Mc'Donalds) to carry them through school or college,now have 45 year old Mexicans doing them.Latinos treat Americans like shit in America yet demand rights as citizens when they are sometimes not even legal!They seem to be more at odds with Blacks than Whites.They kiss White American's asses.

[DanielleNguyen]

thank you all and yes the picture is of me my baby and my husband.

[S_Parc]

Well, growing up up in rural America is a type of Yankee dream of sorts.

If you read Willa Cather's "My Antonia", it's in essence, a snapshot of a man's innocence a/o nostalgia of growing up on the Prairie and his feelings for a country gal, which never came to fruition after he'd moved to Boston & NYC, for school and then for work. The idea was that he'd lost his essence in the big eastern cities but his heart was always in Nebraska with his farm girl, who BTW, ended up marrying a douchebag go figure.