Barb,
To be polite, yet blunt, I think you are just a trifle undereducated in the art of "getting what you need and want."
My wife and I do property management in California, so I can't say specifically what the laws in your state are.
As Claire said, there are laws governing landlords...
Try getting on the net and reading up on your state's rental housing laws. Read your local paper's "action line" - where consumer complaints are resolved. Get to know the author - by reading the column. Once you have a feel for the action line person, write him or her and state your problems and ask for help.
On a metaphysical level, get a vision of where you would like to live. Write it out on paper. Be realistic, but stretch the envelope a little. Perhaps there is a job where you could be a caretaker for an older person, where you are really just there to be a friend and do an occasional errand. There are snowbirds that go to Florida every winter and take a companion with them.
Money is not always what gets you something. A friendly smile sometimes makes a better impression.
There was a song that Mama Cass sang, "You've gotta have a dream, if you don't have a dream, how you gonna make that dream come true?"
The secret is that the physical universe is a manifest record of what you've thought yourself into. If you don't envision your future, you get bupkis. Take the bull by the horns, and start envisioning a better life. Put some goals out there that you really want, and work toward them.
There was a tiny little teeny weenie booklet by Ruth Minshull and Ed Lefson about getting what you want. I don't know the title, but you could probably ask around and find a copy.
If you can just identify two or three major purposes in your life (such as love, beauty, knowledge), and then tailor some goals for yourself to enhance yourself, your family, the world -- then work on those articulated goals, things will begin to fall in place. This is just a law of nature. It really works this way.
Do not envision non survival goals. Think in terms of win win, it enhances your karma. If you can't help thinking non survival thoughts, get someone comfortable to get you to look at each thought and find how each thought solves a problem, you can go earlier with the process by finding earlier similar solutions and the problems that they solved. Eventually you'll find something that makes you laugh. Do this, if necessary, with someone, not by yourself. You don't need an e meter. You just need a kind ear.
There are many things that you can do to raise your personal power, and thus influence your destiny and your ability to do and to have.
If you can find someone to sit with and just look at them (the being, not the body) and vice versa. No "flunks" just enjoying each other's space. You will find your beingness expands, and you can more effortlessly get what you truly want. Each of you can up the gradient by asking "what happened?" when something comes between you as you're doing this.
When my daughter was in college, she was in a production of "Rent." Before each show, she would grab a fellow cast member and just be present with them for ten or fifteen minutes. They would both invariably be better performers because of that quick little action.
Excuse me for not minding my own business.
). Bleat and whine all you want, but allow me to speak for myself.
