Core of Conviction : My Story (9781101563571) by Michele Bachmann Page A

Overnight, we literally fell below the poverty level. For nearly two decades, Mom had been a full-time homemaker, taking care of us kids; now, all of a sudden, she had to go out and find a job. Sadly, she had few marketable skills. She hadn’t stayed long enough at Luther College to get her BA, because when she married, she had followed Dad out to Colorado when he was in the Air Force. She had only a one-year teaching certificate, and that wasn’t worth anything in the Minnesota job market.
    But she was willing to work, and work hard. We qualified for welfare, but Mom wouldn’t think of it. She did not consider herself a political conservative; she just didn’t see us as poor enough to take government help. She knew she could get a job. And so even if we were barely getting by, she was sure she wasn’t going to rely on the government to provide for us.
    So Mom got a sales job at a department store, then found better work as a bank teller—for $4,800 a year. She did her absolute best for us, but it was still an uphill struggle. Soon, it was obvious that we couldn’t afford to stay in our home in Brooklyn Park, and we had to move out. In the small apartment we were moving into, in the farther-out city of Anoka, there wasn’t much room, and because we desperately needed money, Mom held a garage sale. I remember gazing at many of our nicest belongings—my mother’s wedding gifts, all the china—just sitting there on a card table in front of the house we were leaving. People would pass by, looking for bargains, and then snap up something for fifteen cents, or maybe a quarter or a dollar. I remember thinking to myself,
That’s our whole life going away.
All these years later, I am a relentless bargain hunter at yard sales, but even so, when I see something that was obviously someone’s treasured heirloom, I feel a twinge in my heart.
    My parents’ divorce in 1970 was a mile marker in our lives; nothing was the same after that. Our relationships with our extended family changed, and our support structures were altered. Millions of families go through this trauma with disappointed, disillusioned spouses and children who are deprived of the daily support and presence of both parents. Some divorced parents, to be sure, manage their duty to their children with a sense of sacrifice and service—and some don’t. Either way, it’s nearly impossible for the kids to come away from the experience without a sense of loss. But Mom had the blood of all those sturdy forebears running through her; she came from strong stock. And thanks to her, and the child-support checks from our dad, we all survived—and ultimately thrived.
    As the oldest child still living at home, I helped care for my two younger brothers, Gary and Paul. So to inspire them to do their share of the chores—or maybe sometimes more than their share—I developed a point system, scoring various activities, such as doing the dishes or picking the weeds in our itty-bitty garden. Earning points, I assured my little brothers, was a good thing. And what did they get for piling up points? Well, that was a tricky question—because in truth, I didn’t have anything to offer them, except . . . more points! And, of course, compliments, smiles, and hugs. They thrived on sisterly praise. You don’t always have to have material things in life.
    My mother’s mother, Laura—the petite widow who had carried huge trays of bacon around the Rath meatpacking plant in Waterloo till late in her life—would come to visit, bringing canned food and hams in the trunk of her car. I can remember seeing her beige Ford Fairlane, bearing those black-on-white Iowa license plates, and thinking of happier times back in Waterloo. My grandmother had been widowed with seven children before her fiftieth birthday. She was poor before her husband’s death, and after, of course, it was even harder on Mom and