ALICE AWARENESS WEEK DAY 5

I lived in a three-bedroom house with my four siblings, two parents and sometimes grandma. My dad had a job and my mom worked sometimes, usually at the school my brothers and sisters and I attended. As a kid, I wasn’t always aware of the fact that we didn’t have enough money to pay all the bills. I knew we weren’t poor, but we also weren’t able to make ends meet all the time either. I knew when it was my dad’s payday because my mom would splurge and pick up pizza on the way home from school. We lived frugally and somehow made it work. Most of the time. I didn’t know it then, but we were ALICE.

Paydays were precious and everything in between was tough. My dad got paid every two weeks, not twice a month. That’s an important distinction, because it meant two months of the year, there were three, count ‘em, THREE paydays in the month. Three paydays before the electric bill was due. Three paydays before the mortgage was due. Three paydays meant we could catch up. Three paydays meant we could go to a sit-down restaurant and not just breeze through the drive through. Three paydays meant breathing room. But even three paydays wasn’t enough to get ahead. 

My mom was fiercely protective of the thermostat. The house I grew up in had oil heat. My parents couldn't always afford to fill up the tank when it ran low. I remember my dad bundling up to go out to knock on the side of the oil drum to see how low it was, hoping it wasn’t as low as our bank account balance. A hollow sound at the top and bottom meant it was going to be a cold night. 

My sister and I would wrap ourselves in a blanket and stand in front of the oven and turn it on for just a minute, either until we warmed up or until Mom caught us and yelled at us to stop and shut the oven door. Whichever came first. 

When nights like that came, my parents, all my brothers and sisters and sometimes grandma would sleep out in the living room with blankets and sleeping bags and the space heater from the bathroom pointed at us on full blast. I was young enough that I had no concept of money or bills or oil or heat. I just knew it was fun to have a family sleepover in the living room. On nights like that, what we didn’t burn in oil, we would run up in an electric bill. But that was next month’s problem to deal with. 

When payday came in a couple days, we’d be able to put some oil in the tank. When the furnace would finally kick on, there would be a low rumble and my brothers and sisters and I would all jump and run to a vent in the floor and stand above it, letting the heat fill the robes and blankets wrapped around us, soaking up every bit of warmth we could while we could.

This winter, United Way of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County is collecting donations of items for the ALICE Essentials Drive.

The ALICE Essentials Drive is a donation drive to support working households with children. Donated items will help ease the financial strain for families living paycheck to paycheck by freeing up funds in a family’s tight budget to pay bills and put towards other expenses. All items donated will go to local families living and working in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County. We’ll be teaming up with our Community Partners to distribute collected items to working households with children. Collect and donate items through January 24, 2025. 

Get Involved

Host a collection point. Sign up to collect donations of items from your family, friends, coworkers, neighbors or other connections in the community.

Donate items to the drive. Drop off donated items at the United Way of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County’s office at 100 S. Mason St, Harrisonburg, VA 22801 between 9am-5pm Monday through Friday.  

Make a monetary donation. Don’t have time to shop? Prefer to give money, not stuff? Let us do the shopping for you. Make a donation to the ALICE Essentials Drive.