We were living in a tough situation, but my mother managed; she juggled. Sometimes we'd pay the light bill, sometimes we paid the phone, sometimes the gas went off.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My parents were dealing with evictions and repossessions and electricity getting shut off, and I just realized that I had to get it together.
I come from a simple background, so I couldn't call my father and say, 'Come pay my bills,' so I had to get out there and work.
When I was very small, the electricity was turned off because we didn't pay the bill. I remember sitting by the oil lamp listening to my mother playing 'Careless Love' on the piano.
When I was a young boy, very young boy, mothers didn't work. Women were home, they took care of the house, they washed the dishes and took care of the children. That's what they did, and that's what my mother did.
When my mother died, I fell apart. My father wanted to control me. As a consequence, I ran away to America.
I had moved out of the Edison Hotel because I couldn't pay the bill and was living at the Lincoln Hotel, where I couldn't pay the bill either, but it was cheaper.
My family and high school friends were the only people who were with me every step of the way through my mothers' illness. They sat by my side year after year and consoled me. If they ever sent me a bill, I would be paying them off for the rest of my life.
I'm a working mother... You try to pay the bills, you try to keep your life going and there's pressure.
I had my electricity turned off three times because I never had time to pay my bills. It was a joke. I'm making a ton of money, and I'm walking around my apartment with flashlights.
It was my father who - after, at age 15, I had attempted unsuccessfully to drive the family car using a 'borrowed' key and knocked down a wall of the garage - convinced me over the telephone not to run away from home and who then came home from work not to punish me but rather to console and comfort me.