American Winter Page #3

I try to just kind of

tell her, "It's OK, Mom. It'll be OK."

And, like, I just try to

encourage her as much as I can.

Being the only

"man of the house,"

I should say, it's...

it's kind of my job, I guess.

Is he

your boyfriend?

- Is that why? Who is he?

- No.

He was my first friend on

the first day of school.

He sat right across from me.

- Is it a date?

- No, it's not.

I can feel you staring at me.

OK, so this

isn't a date, right?

- No.

- No date? OK.

- No date.

- Told you.

- Dad is gonna wig.

- I said the same thing.

OK, well,

you have fun. No date.

No kissing. No sitting.

No hugging.

No hand-touching.

I mean it, sissy.

Ha ha!

- Love you.

- Love you.

- Be good.

- It was nice to meet you, Tara.

Nice to meet you, too.

Sissy, be good.

We can go over to Mom's

and shower till Dad gets home.

She said we can just run people

through if we want to.

- Do you need to shower?

- Yeah.

OK. That's what I figured.

The power was shut off.

The gas has been

shut off now, too.

Water. Water's gone.

No electricity.

Our neighbor has let us

use his electricity.

He is the nicest guy in

the whole, entire world.

Like, we wouldn't have

got through any of this

if it wasn't for him.

- Yeah.

- So I do everything for him

that I possibly can to make

his life easier 'cause he's...

- The lawn.

- He's let us

- plug in a cord to his garage and

he's, you know... - So we can warm water.

These are used for bathing,

to flush the toilets,

to do the dishes, to...

I mean, this is

our water source.

The water outside,

it's filled with...

Bugs. Got to boil. Ha ha!

Ha! See all that

gross stuff in there?

I remember when he told me

when he was losing his job,

but I didn't really think...

I don't know.

I didn't think it was a big deal

until our water was turned off.

It's just, like, embarrassing 'cause you

can't bring your friends over to your house

and you can't tell anybody

about it, really.

School's already stressful enough,

but having things like this happen,

it's hard to concentrate

because I'm so worried.

We got a letter

from PGE the other day that said,

"We're worried about your children,

and if you can get a doctor's note

that says that it's detrimental

for your children's health

to have the power off, then we can

maybe work something out with you. "

I'm just waiting

for Children's Services

to come knock on the door

and take my kids away.

I... F***.

If capitalism is not

regulated or checked,

there's a harsh logic,

and it will always seek out the

lowest costs, highest return,

which is why we have

historically viewed government

as a check

and a balance on that.

Over the last quarter-century,

we have reduced regulations,

degraded wages,

cut back on healthcare.

We've reduced taxes, and now

people are more vulnerable.

And my job is

to communicate to people

the absolute moral imperative

during these times

of using public resources

to maintain the safety net

until things turn around

and to make sure that

we don't throw some of our most vulnerable

people, essentially, to the wolves.

You need to seriously

fix this drawer.

You know how annoying it is when you

try and open up a dresser drawer

when you're getting ready for

work and it doesn't open right?

You don't have work.

I don't have a job yet, but I hope to

have one soon. Are you with me on that?

Yeah. Come on. Go, go.

Came home from work

one day, and my son looks at me

and says, "Dad's in the back

of that ambulance. "

And I said,

"Gunner, I'm not"... 'cause Gunner liked

to play little jokes on Mommy and

I thought he was just kidding.

They said within him being

there not even two hours

that he was septic, that

they didn't expect him to

live through Saturday, and

that he was going to die.

And what was the hardest is that

I hadn't... I hadn't told Gunner,

and I remember going to the hotel,

and Gunner just kept asking me,

"Did that just really happen, Mom?

Did Dad just really die?"

I said, "Yeah, baby, he did. "

It was hard, very hard.

Uh-oh. Look at

what's in here.

You think it's time we

threw Dad's clothes away?

- Mm-hmm.

- Huh?

Does it matter much now?

Well, I don't think

I can keep them forever.

Oh. Look at... Remember,

this was Dad's favorite shirt?

Living in a

garage with my son is nerve-wracking.

Little bit bigger than

a hotel room, I would say,

but with no windows and there's

no heating in here whatsoever.

We just are ready

for our own space

and our own home.

Mom, I'm hungry.

And Dad always said

that we're survivors,

and so we'll survive.

We'll get through this.

Oh, my God, they're closed.

Oh, they're closed, huh?

That's funny.

Huh. Now what do we do?

- Don't we have to, like...

- I'm sorry.

I thought they were

open until 7:
00.

Like, I'm not really worrying

about the food situa...

Of course you're not.

You're not a mother.

You don't worry

about your son being hungry.

Not the end of the world.

You always had something

for dinner hot to eat.

I don't need a fricking

hot meal. Dang.

- Yes, you do.

- No, I don't.

- You have school tomorrow.

- And I can have...

I don't want you to go to

sleep with an empty belly.

All right.

OK, OK, OK, OK.

We'll figure this out, right?

All right.

Sorry. If I'd have

known it was closed,

we wouldn't have come out

all this way for nothing.

- Right?

- Yeah.

If you're constantly moving

from apartment to apartment,

or apartment to car

or car to motel...

which happens,

and it happens here

in Portland...

kids struggle to learn.

In the middle of a crisis,

sometimes it is hard

to think about

investing in very early,

young children

because your pay-offs are coming

15, 20, 30 years down the road.

But if you don't, those problems will be

there 15, 20, 30 years down the road.

Hi.

So don't even talk to me.

Tell me what happened.

I'm excited.

Don't get too excited.

It was a long process,

just... I went in there,

filled out my application,

gave them my application.

And, uh...

So, what'd he say?

They got to, uh, go

through a couple more guys.

OK.

I'm kidding. I got it.

Did you?

- When do you start?

- Tomorrow morning.

- Are you serious?

- Yeah.

Are you serious?

T.J. got a job.

Thank you, Lord.

And so that's been helping out.

I mean, he's working.

We haven't seen a paycheck,

but he's working.

He's making some money.

I just know

that today, right now,

the kids have food

in their stomach

and they don't have

to worry about being...

out on the streets.

- Is it really part-time?

- Yeah.

He said part-time

to full-time.

- Proud of me?

- Yeah!

- Good.

- I'm so happy now.

Yeah, I'm relieved

that my dad got a job,

even if it is minimum wage.

Then it's still...

I'm OK with it.

We still are going to

get money to pay the bills

and not have to worry about

our power going off again.

Our country holds

that the richer the rich get,

the better off everyone will be.

And that rich business guys

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