Broke
When I was a child and I would ask my father for money he would almost invariably demur on the grounds that we were going through what he euphemistically referred to as a temporary “cash flow crisis.”
I was amused as well as frustrated by that phrase because it made it seem like we were a small business going through a tough time and not a family of three headed by a depressed, perpetually under or unemployed father trying to raise two complicated children on an eighteen thousand dollar a year government stipend.
There was nothing temporary about my dad’s cash flow crisis. It did not come and go. It did not pass. It was permanent.
I think a lot about my dad these days. Growing up my heart hurt for him and how difficult it must have been to try to raise two children by himself without money or resources or a partner when he was having difficulty just taking care of himself.
I empathized deeply with what my dad was going through when my older sister and myself were going through that awful middle-school phase. I vowed that I wouldn’t end up like my dad.
That has been a huge motivation behind my life and career. I wanted to have the stability that I did not have growing up. I wanted to be able to do for my children what my father was not able to provide for me despite the best of intentions: a secure childhood where they never have to worry about the bottom falling out or losing everything.
Despite twenty-six years of furious, joyful labor as a professional pop culture writer and a fair amount of professional success I nevertheless feel like I’m where my dad was when I was twelve years old.
I’m self-employed but on a very real level I’m unemployed. I don’t have enough money to get by. I’m in a terrifying amount of debt. I gave up a solid salaried position as the head writer for something that I thought was better in The Dissolve and when that fell through I did not have anything to replace it.
One of the worst parts of struggling financially is all of the shame and guilt that come along with it, that aching, gnawing sense that I have failed my family as well as myself yet am powerless to make things better.
When I think about my current financial state, I do not think of it as a temporary cash flow crisis. I’m not a fan of euphemistic language when you can substitute brutal truths.
The brutal truth of the matter is that I don’t think my cash flow crisis will end any more than my dad’s did. I worry that I will struggle for years, even decades to come, all the while hoping against hope that things would, at some point, get better.
That has been my fervent wish for the last decade or so: that things would get better. I tried to convince myself that the website would attract more patrons and readers, that my new books would sell better than the old ones and that I would be able to make more money through freelancing.
The deep depression I am currently experiencing has robbed me of much. It’s taken the joy I generally experience from doing simple things like writing or listening to true crime podcasts. But perhaps the biggest and most important thing it has stolen is that fuzzy, all-important sense of hope and possibility.
Depression and anxiety have stripped me of optimism and hope, of the sense that tomorrow will be better than today and that things will, at some point, become easier rather than harder.
I’m not having a cash flow crisis, temporary or otherwise.
I’m broke.
I’m permanently broke. It’s the kind of brokenness that enacts a steep psychological toll, an exhausting, dispiriting, paralyzing brokenness I feel with my whole body and soul.
That’s what I am. I’m broke. I’m busted. I am devoid of optimism as well as funds. I would love to be able to say that that will change at some point but I’m not sure that’s true.
I will keep working hard to try to make the best possible life for myself and my family but I feel like years and years of struggle and frustration have made it difficult, if not impossible, to even imagine a future that isn’t an exhausting daily struggle.
Check out The Joy of Trash: Flaming Garbage Fire Extended Edition at https://www.nathanrabin.com/shop and get a free, signed "Weird Al” Yankovic-themed coloring book for free! Just 18.75, shipping and taxes included! Or, for just 25 dollars, you can get a hardcover “Joy of Positivity 2: The New Batch” edition signed (by Felipe and myself) and numbered (to 50) copy with a hand-written recommendation from me within its pages. It’s truly a one-of-a-kind collectible!
I’ve also written multiple versions of my many books about “Weird Al” Yankovic that you can buy here: https://www.nathanrabin.com/shop
Or you can buy The Joy of Trash from Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Joy-Trash-Nathan-Definitive-Everything/dp/B09NR9NTB4/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= but why would you want to do that?
Check out my new Substack at https://nathanrabin.substack.com/
And we would love it if you would pledge to the site’s Patreon as well. https://www.patreon.com/nathanrabinshappyplace