I can't believe that I've had to do this...

 

     But earlier today, I had to set up a GoFundMe campaign for the first time.

     I almost feel like a selfish prick for doing it. I'm very well aware that there are many people who are much worse off than I am. Over the years, Go Fund Me has helped out countless people who have been hit with crushing medical bills after a sudden illness or an accident. Families devastated by a sudden death. People who have been evicted by their slumlords when they couldn't pay rental increases and were forced to live in their cars. It's also been used to support people who had been the victims of insufferable injustices.

     And I know many of us are feeling the pinch, especially since January 20th when a certain orange psychopath got shoehorned back in the White House. But, as I said in my GFM campaign, when times like these descend upon us out of the blue, we have to necessarily turn our attention to more parochial concerns and see to our own affairs. 

     The fact is, I have nothing but ice cubes in my freezer. I have little food in the fridge or the cupboards. Old Mother Hubbard had nothing on me these days. I literally have $4 in the bank and nothing in Paypal. Just yesterday, I had to use the Kennedy half dollars that Barbara and I had collected over the years that were mailed to us by charity organizations and it broke my heart to spend them because half of them belonged to her.

     I have very little confidence that I'll get my SSI benefits tomorrow. They've never made me wait until the 31st to send my disbursement and when that voice in my head tells me something is amiss, it's never, ever wrong. So, in the likelihood that I wake up tomorrow disappointed, I'm prepared to take to my phone and start waging war against my own government. I'm still desperately trying to play catch up because I didn't know this would be an issue until a couple of days ago.

      Here's what I did: Two nights ago, I went to Grok 3, the AI created by Twitter and explained the situation to it. It immediately gave me phone numbers to a multitude of resources ranging from legal aid, food banks, the local SNAP office, how to reach my Congressman and so forth. Trust me, the irony hasn't been lost on me that the only help I'm getting from anyone is an AI chatbot in a domain owned by the same fucking asshole who's doing this to me in the first place.

     Now I'm reading people may have to wait months to get back their benefits they should've been getting all along due to glitches and people bolting for the exits, which just further lowers my confidence that I'll finally get my money tomorrow.

     I do not like going on public relief any more than I like to set up a GoFundMe pubically begging for money. But I'm under the gun in a variety of ways. #1, I have to top up my cell phone minutes by April 6th. If I don't, they'll shut off my service. After six weeks, they'll give my number to someone else. Like many of us, I heavily rely on my cell phone to keep me in touch with the outside world. And if I lose that, nobody in a position to help me will be able to call or text me.

     Another, more serious, consideration: I got shunted to Medicare on January 1st last year, more than two weeks before I turned 65. I immediately started getting hit with bloated $175 monthly premiums that came right out of my Social Security benefits. If those premiums don't get paid after several months, those bloated premiums will snowball until the debt reaches hundreds of dollars. Then, if I do get my benefits back, will Medicare start clawing back 100% of my payments until the debt is satisfied, putting me right back where I am now? I'm afraid so. That's what they're doing to people they've decided were overpaid. They're clawing back 100% of their benefits until the alleged overpayment is paid. (During the Biden administration, the clawback was 10%).

     Again, I hate to do this. But out of all the emergencies I've gone through over the last 16 years, this is by far the worst. Those of us who are experiencing this shit are plainly not to blame for this. And my heart goes out to every one of them.

     We shouldn't be living in a country in which crowd sourcing is the answer to economic devastation, that we have to rely on our fellow citizens when one system or another fails us. But this is what it is. And I have to throw myself upon the mercy of others just to keep body and soul together. Again, I wish I didn't have to do this because I did not bring this about.