Because we live in a big house out in the country with an addition that once housed a swimming pool, people who don’t know us often assume we’re higher up the income ladder than we really are. Sometimes, just to shock people, I’ve joked about how we live “just above the cut-off line for reduced-price school lunches.”
Well, guess what? Between Bob’s pay cut last year and my recently shorn part-time hours, we’ve now crossed that socioeconomic barrier. All we have to do is fill out the paperwork, and our kids could be eating lunch for 40 cents a day.
That’s not likely to happen anytime soon, because our three youngest kids are still home-schooled and Rowan, who’s in high school, prefers to pack a vegetarian lunch unless it’s potato-bar day at the cafeteria.
But it’s a weird feeling to wrap your head around. Should you tap a government program if it helps you save money? Is it cool to shock people with how low your family income is if your income is no longer a matter of choice but of circumstance? Should we go into emergency financial crisis mode because of our change in status, even though we don‘t rely on my income for day-to-day living expenses? Should I get another part-time job?
We’re still sorting out the answers to these questions. But in the meantime, it’s a handy way to say no to things I’m not interested in doing anyway: Sorry, can’t. Didn’t you hear? We’ve been demoted to reduced-price lunch.
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