Tag: #OWS

He has the thick hard fingers of a carpenter, nails short and blunt, yet he can tie a micro-filament knot with the delicacy of a surgeon. Fly fishing season was nearly over, and there was little to do these days but prep for next year. The sound of the phone not ringing was almost palpable over the drone of the local news broadcast at noon. Another idle day, the contractor must had not coughed up the money for the next delivery of materials. His girlfriend had been making noises about him moving in with her and her two very young kids. It felt too soon, but his rent was already two weeks late. The cops beating on those people was depressing as hell; he turned off the news and went outside to rake the last of the fall leaves.

She was an angel. That’s what she like to call her temp job doing in-home care for the elderly. She was getting attached to her clients, and had already gotten in trouble for cleaning one persons house while they slept. “Not in your job description,” she was told. Worse? When she helped that half blind lady write out her checks, she learned that the company was getting over three times her pay an hour for her services. She would love to work for herself, save them money and perhaps make a little more. Things were tight enough, and she was up against enough keeping custody of her two daughters being openly gay. But self-employed meant paying for a LLC license and having to insure herself heavily. Hell, they didn’t have health insurance at home, how could she afford to insure a business? She had no idea what the demonstrations were about, but the pastor at her church said they were anarchists. Sounded scary.