In Anna Quindlen’s “Stuff is Not Salvation” she discusses the hard economic times of the United States in the year of 2008. Qunidlen goes in to specifics about, stock-market declines, bankruptcy, foreclosures, layoffs, and the effect it has had on Americans. She illustrates her own personal experiences, to give the reader examples of how the economical hard times have affected the way people spend their money and their family values. Quindlen’s purpose for writing this article is to bring awareness to, addiction to consumption by the American people. Her solution to these nationwide issues is, simply to appreciate possessions more and to have real meaning to things, instead of materialistic reasons. I personally, understand Qunindlen’s perspective because; my family has been hit hard by the recession and is faced with debt and foreclosure.
My parents use to spend so much money on new cars, new TV’s, and materialistic items; for example, designer purses and high end car parts for my dad’s “project” car. We were living life comfortably until my mother lost her job, my dad’s hours got cut, and I lost my job as well. The money just stopped flowing in; and my parents and I went into debt with everything fast. Cell phones got turned off, Comcast channels disappeared, and no more vacations or eating out to dinner every night. Eventually, our house went in to foreclosure and was bought by a real estate company, forcing my family to relocate. It has been stressful for my family; it seems like we can never get a break, bad things just happened to us, repeatedly. After losing pretty much everything we worked for, my family somehow was able to hold on to our sanity, by supporting each other. Now, my family does not care about, not having designer bags and high end car parts. We just try to survive as a family; and we accept that we can no longer have the things we want, but only to survive off of the essentials in life. The Short’s strive for greatness, and one day we will have that opportunity to live life with no worries, no debt, and to have our cake and eat it too.
Tiffany,
ReplyDeleteI so hear you on that one I am broke all the time half the time I don't even know how I'm gonna pay my bills this economy sucks.
Hey Tiffany, I like how you kind of describe everything in detail and everything that Anna is talking about exactly. I can only imagine how hard it was to all of a sudden get cut off of all the luxuries you and your family had.
ReplyDeleteTiffany,
ReplyDeleteYou related a lot to Anna's story. You went through what Anna was trying to tell us to avoid. I loved how you and your family held together through everything that happened to you. I knew exactly how it feels to be broke. I had to relocate to a new house as well because my parents divorced and my mom couldn't pay the rent all by herself. Sometimes we'd be lucky to even get some food on the table.
Tiffany you went into depth with your response. Good paragraph structure. I am glad everything work out for you and your family. I can relate to you as well. My family bought a new house when the economy wasn't in the shit. Then our house foreclosed, and we been in 4 different house since then.
ReplyDeleteTiffany,
ReplyDeleteI loved all the detail in your blog. I'm sorry to hear that the recession hit you hard,I think that it did us all a little bit of damage. I love how you guys didn't care about the things anymore and just about the family that you had and working together through it all. I love reading your blogs.