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Being poor sucks.
Unless you’re Adam Shepard, the author of Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, and the Search for the American Dream
Shepard’s book is a rebuttal to Barbara Ehrenreich’s “Nickel and Dimed” and “Bait and Switch,” two stories which tell the tales of the working poor in America. They fry burgers, scrub toilets and wait tables and get no money or respect for their toils. The punch line? The American Dream is a farce.
But Shepard, a fresh-faced kid straight out of college set out to prove her wrong. The native North Carolinian heads out to the wilds of Charleston, South Carolina, with a sleeping bag, the clothes on his back and $25 dollars to find the American Dream (and most likely, himself, because that’s how these stories normally conclude). He forbids himself from relying on his college education or previous contacts to make a go of it. (more…)
