Roller-Coastering Through the Economic Crisis
By Sandra H.
July 6, 2009

I must say, that for most of my life, it's been pretty easy. I had worked for many years and things were so good that my husband (Bill) and I decided I could quit working and stay home with our young daughter Melissa. It was great, from kindergarten to 3rd grade I was the class room mom, the field trip mom, and my kid actually wanted me to be in her class. It doesn't get any better than that. I even took accounting classes at Canada College and started doing the books for Bill's plumbing contracting business. Having a husband for a boss was a dream job. Every time I asked for vacation, I got it! We both love to travel so it was never hard trying to convince him. We would usually work about nine months out of the year and take various little trips whenever work was slow.

But then in 2001 Bill became ill and had to close the company, which meant we were both out of work and didn't get unemployment. When the business closed I had to find work to support my family and get us health insurance. In 2002 I ended up working in the pharmaceutical industry (which pays really well). So we were back to living the good life again.

We took exotic trips to Thailand and Cambodia, skied in the Italian Alps. In November 2005 we took a month long trip to Costa Rica which included, hiking through Manuel Antonio National Park being chased by squirrel monkeys, yelling back and forth with the howler monkeys and lazily starring up at the three-toed sloth, doing what looked like an upside down Iron Cross. We spent Thanksgiving day in a quaint little town called Tortuguero, on the Caribbean side, wandering the beach searching for baby turtle prints and looking at the beautiful sea shells. They didn't have any turkey so the closest thing to it was a lovely jerk chicken dinner at Miss Junie's restaurant. It was no small feat getting to Tortuguero. From San Jose, the Capitol of Costa Rica, we had to take 2 buses and a 1 hour boat ride.

On the way back to San Jose we encountered a bandito. On the first bus trip a man had stolen my backpack unbeknownst to me. Luckily the locals on the bus saw him and turned him in to the federales who accompanied the bus. The federales returned to the bus and approached me.

"Excuse me miss", he said, "Is this your backpack?"

I was stunned. How did he get my backpack, I wondered?

"Yes", I replied, "How did you get this?" He went on to tell me about the bandito and that they have problems on the buses, especially with tourist.

I thanked him and kept my backpack where I could see it. They immediately threw him this bandito off the bus in a desolate area with no towns in sight. Ha, serves him right! I had my wallet and passport in my pocket so he didn't get his hands on much, just my trinkets and unmailed postcards. On the second bus we were riding along eating our pollo frito (fried chicken) and drinking watermelon aqua fresha when all of a sudden the bus came to a stop in the middle of nowhere. The driver announced the bridge was still out (and had been for several years) and we would have to pack our belongings by foot across a rickety bridge filled with gaping potholes, windows to the raging river 25 feet below. Their roads leave a bit to be desired. Once we made our way to the other side, another bus was waiting for us. Funny, they never mentioned this extra "adventure tour" in the brochure!

But recently, I was laid-off from a small biotech in South San Francisco, along with 95% of the company. In the drug business, when you have a failed clinical trial and a drug recall in the same week, it's instant death for a small company. Between my husband's disability and my unemployment we don't qualify for many of the programs which are supposed to be in place to help people in our situation, such as food stamps, welfare, health insurance or free groceries from the food bank. We have cut out all travel and tightened our belts in order to pay the bills we have. Luckily with the savings we thankfully have and our stocks, which aren't quite what they use to be, we will ride out this downturn and look forward to the trip back up.

In the meantime, I had decided to plant a vegetable garden in my front yard, and yes, I started mine before Michelle Obama did and it became fashionable. The reason for this is two-fold. I heard on the local news that because of the drought, the price of tomatoes and lettuce would skyrocket. Apparently the men in charge out in Sacramento are not going to give the farmers in the Fresno valley much water due to the drought. As if the California budget crisis wasn't bad enough, now our claim to fame, "California feeds the nation" will create an even bigger budget crisis from the lost revenue of food never planted. So the farmers too will soon share my fate; this unemployment is very contagious. Secondly, I figure since I'm no longer a part of the working society, I might as well try and feed my family the old fashioned way. According to an article I recently saw in the Washington Post, there is a 30% increase in the sales of vegetable seeds. Yet another statistic I have become!

It's been an interesting ride and with the support and strength of our family we will surely survive the economic crisis. We are hopeful President Obama will turn this nation around financially, environmentally and humanitarily, so its citizens are proud to say they are Americans.