你小时候是如何发现自己很穷的？

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Kya Pauley, AI Engineer
I was 11 when I first realized we were poor. I broke my thumb playing softball and my mother was very adamant that we could not go to the ER, but the bus driver was equally adamant that I couldn’t go to school with an eggplant for a hand, either.
That day I got an earful about how much my insurance copay meant that my mother wouldn’t be able to pay some bill or another. I didn’t give a crap, I was just glad she was taking me to the damn doctor for once.
Over the next few years of middle school I learned that most of my friends went to the doctor when they got sick, received clothes that weren’t from Goodwill more than once a year, had birthday parties and Christmas presents and so on. They did not have to work at a concession stand on weekends to earn their lunch money for the week, went to restaurants and had fast food sometimes, and they could invite their friends over without being lectured about how much it costs to feed another person. If they missed the bus, their mothers actually drove them to school and there was no discussion about gas money.

Kya Pauley, AI工程师
我11岁时第一次意识到我们家很穷。我打垒球的时候拇指骨折了，我妈妈坚持说我们不能去急诊室，但是公交车司机也坚持说我不能带着肿成茄子的手去学校。
那天我听到一大堆关于我的保险意味着我的母亲将无法支付一些帐单或别的多少的私语。我不在乎，我只是很高兴她能带我去看一次医生。

在接下来的几年中，我了解到我的大多数朋友生病时都去看医生，每年的生日派对和圣诞等会不止一次收到来自非平民商店的衣服。
他们不必在周末在小卖部工作来赚取一周的午餐钱，有时还会去餐馆、吃快餐。他们可以邀请他们的朋友来家里，而不用听他们讲养活一个人要花多少钱。如果他们错过了公共汽车，他们的母亲就会开车送他们去学校，而不用讨论油钱的问题。
这一切听起来都太棒了。

当时，其实我们还没那么穷。
我母亲有一份每小时赚12美元的工作，我们有一间小房子和一辆车，我一般都设法不挨饿，也不赤身裸体。但有几个月，我们不得不在我教母家洗澡，因为家里的水被切断了，或者我们只能住在教母家，因为家里没有电等等。但事情并没有那么糟糕，在我看来一切都很正常。
后来在我14岁的时候房子被收回了，事情从“对我来说似乎很正常”变成了“哦，该死，我们很穷”。那时候我还没有意识到，但那个时候我妈妈屈服于她的鸦片瘾，也不愿意……你知道的，照顾她的孩子。

每隔几个月，我们就会从一个公寓搬到另一个公寓，因为我妈妈会开空头支票来付押金，然后我们就会因为没有付款而被赶出去。
一年之后，我们都成了无家可归的人，有时睡在车里，有时住在图森（美亚利桑那州）南边I-19公路旁的汽车旅馆房间里。在那段时间里，我感染了许多葡萄球菌，至今仍有伤疤——那是一个有趣的夏天。

后来，即使我们在政府补贴的社区里有了一套稳定的公寓，生活还是相当艰难。我们的电力不断被切断(由于综合设施良好，我们仍然有水)，我认为我目前的近视与一直在黑暗中做作业有关。我们没有日用品，我靠学校的免费早餐/午餐计划生活。我非常幸运，有一位老师注意到了我，并对我表示同情。每当我饿的时候，他就会把花生酱三明治的配料放在教室里。



Brynn Gonzales
One hint was when I was ten and I was talking with my mom. I was like, “remember that really boring road trip we went on when I was six?” She was confused at first, so i kept describing it. She finally realized what i was talking about and said, “No, we were homeless and living in the car.”
Another hint was when I went to my friend Zoë''s house. She had just moved here from Germany. I thought her house was a mansion, but she told me that it was very small. She said her house in Germany was about twice the size. I lived in a one room apartment at the time.
Another time, I read a poem in English class. It was about American suburban culture. We had to discuss, it, and everyone was talking about how they don''t like the culture. They talked about moms in minivans driving their kids to soccer practice, and trips to Cosco in which you bring some cartloads of food, and having such an excess of food that you have to have two fridges. They talked so negatively about that kind of culture, but I would give anything to have enough food to fill up even one fridge.
The thing that really brought everything together was when my parents began to fight. They argued about money, and how they couldn''t pay taxes, and how they were going to have to take on more jobs in order to feed us. I was eleven, at the time, and I realized then that we were actually really poor, poor enough to be below the poverty line.

一个暗示是，在我十岁的时候，我和我妈妈聊天。我说:“还记得我六岁时我们那次很无聊的自驾游吗?一开始她很困惑，所以我一直在描述。她终于明白了我的意思，说:“不，我们无家可归，住在车里。”
另一个暗示是，我去了我朋友Zoe家。她刚从德国搬到这里。我以为她的房子是豪宅，但她告诉我它很小。她说她在德国的房子大约有这个的两倍大。那时我住在一个只有一个房间的公寓里。

还有一次，我在英语课上读了一首诗。它是关于美国郊区文化的，我们必须参与讨论，每个人都在谈论他们如何不喜欢这种文化。他们谈到妈妈们开着小货车带着孩子去参加足球训练，或者去Cosco的旅行，你带了一车的食物，食物太多了，你不得不买两个冰箱。他们对这种文化的评价很负面，但我愿意付出一切来获得足够的食物，哪怕只是填满一个冰箱。

真正把一切联系在一起的是我父母开始吵架的时候。他们为钱而争吵，为他们如何付不起税而争吵，为我们如何不得不接受更多的工作而争吵。那年我十一岁，那时我意识到我们真的很穷，穷到低于贫困线的地步。