So you told your kids what?

You know I started work when I was 12 years old.  My next door neighbor was a cop. He needed a shooker and a stacker to make boxes. We made grape boxes, juice boxes and lug boxes. In the spring, we made cherry boxes. I got paid $.25 per 100. I also have the paper route. I delivered 140 papers every morning except for Sunday. On Wednesday, I delivered more than on 40 merchandisers. My grades in school were high enough that I could apply for a working permit. I worked for a landscaper and yard maintenance company. I mowed lawns every day after school and on Saturday. I also assisted with any landscaping, sprinkler, or rock sales project my boss had acquired. I worked that job until I graduated from high school. I even had the honor of cutting my fingers off in a lawn mower. After high school, I went to junior college. My family had no concept of what college was. My father was the youngest of 14 children none of my aunts, uncles, cousins had ever going to college. I had one cousin who Afters high school went to work for the Alcohol Beverage Control. He did go to college and finally became the first in our extended family to graduate college. Why did I go to college did I have dreams of higher aspirations. Hell no! If you didn't go to college, you were drafted. But that even changed when they took away the 2S deferment. But I continued to work and go to school. I worked at a furniture store call the Breuners. Furniture jobs were union jobs. But they sold linens and housewares and lamp, books, and other things. I continued to work until I decided to go back to school. Every one of those jobs including making boxes SSI was taken out of my check. Do I have more than 40 quarters of contributions to SSI. Yeah! And a lot more. I didn't finish college the first time. The draft became a lottery the only thing that I ever won. I got on number. But I went back to college because I want to become a teacher. Maybe it was a generative thing. I taught for over 25 years. Most people think they know teaching because they went to school. But! It is not like anything you knew sitting at a desk. God! I wish at the end they would actually sit in there desks. Now call me a Pollyanna. I thought retirement was going to be good. Yeah I got money but I also have two kids in college. What about that Social Security you ask?  Oh I don't get any of that.  You're welcome more for you. What about tax-sheltered annuities? 911 2001 ! half of that was gone. Didn't recover when the stock market recovered. Fees and sleight-of-hand of the managers made sure of that. Just as things were starting to look doable, George Bush allowed his buddies in the banks and Wall Street to steal the treasury of United States. It was perfect extortion. Either bail us out and make us whole of we'll destroy the economy. My dad always said, "A man with a briefcase can steal more than a man with a gun."  There went everything that I owned and every dollar that I had was a chase to save the little I had. Sadly, it didn't work. See banks didn't own your loan. There were only by something called hedge fund managers. I'll tell you right now if I ever find one I'm in a beat the shit out of them. I guarantee they run in different circles for me. So I probably will never meet one. So now I might as well be a undocumented worker. I get to stay home all day and clean house and do dishes. Do I get to do the fun things that I thought I was going to do when I retired, bowling, golf, travel.  No I'm not so much. All that's be honest here were all friends, not at all. Who has money for travel with the cost of gas? I'm  going to turn 65 years old in a few short months and I'm the most miserable person on the face of the earth. I know nobody cares they have their own problems. But I'm letting you know there's no American Dream. Of course if you're hedge fund manager yeah you're dreaming of next year getting golden balls. Did you see the Wolf of Wall Street. So I hope that I have enough health to last me another 10 maybe 20 years. So I can become the most miserable fucking idiot on the face of the earth. So just one word of advice don't ask me how it's going.