You think you've got it rough? You should have been around when I was a kid. Our whole family lived in a nice travel trailer in Denver.
We ate nothing but corn on the cob and lasagna and we drank glasses of grape juice, and we were glad to have them. Sometimes on Thursdays we had mulligan stew. I slept on a carpet in the laundry room. My three sisters slept in the boiler room.
I had to get up every morning at five to feed the brine shrimp and the crocodile. After that, I had to scrub the ballroom and feel the ashtray.
I walked five meters through drought and snowstorms to get to school every morning, wearing only a jumpsuit and a romper. We had to learn carpentry and meteorology, all in the space of fourteen years.
Mom worked hard, making striking mushrooms by hand and selling them for only twenty-one pfennig each. She had to monitor every mushroom twenty-six times.
Dad worked as a crime scene investigator and earned only ten farthings a day. We couldn't afford any pairs of binoculars, so we made do with only a jar of olives.
In spite of all the hardships, we grew up sincere and moody.