Shutdown stories: How congressional quarreling is affecting us..

Bank accounts are short a couple hundred bucks. Federal employees fret about not heading to work. Vacations are delayed, canceled or ruined. Basic everyday services disappear.

Those are some of the effects Americans saw Tuesday morning after the U.S. government staggered to a stop at midnight, and millions, including 800,000 furloughed federal workers, began to cope with the hiccups — some irritating but small and others large and worrisome.
As the shutdown starts, Yahoo News is cataloging anecdotes Americans are sharing with us. Below are excerpts from some first-person accounts we received Tuesday. If you’re directly and concretely affected by the shutdown, we’re interested in your story. Learn how to contribute.
Savings accounts unfortunately replace income in a shutdown

View gallery

.

Vonda J. Sines

Vonda J. Sines, 65, of Herndon, Va., retired in 2004 from a federal government job and thought the shutdowns of 1995 and ‘96 long past. Now, with Congress’ shuttering of the government less than 24 hours old, she and her husband notice an immediate hit: The loss of his income from his federal contractor job means a $174.33 drop from their budget each day the shutdown persists. It’s also put a scare into her as she enters Social Security. Sines writes:
Covered by the newer federal retirement system, I'm eligible for Social Security and signed up for Medicare Parts A and B in 2012. I had decided to apply in October for Social Security payments starting Jan. 1, 2014.
Because I had questions about my benefits, I opted not to apply online, but to schedule an interview. Then I read that a shutdown could mean no processing of Social Security applications. Even imagining the potential backlog triggered a headache.
I scrambled to get an appointment. After 42 minutes on hold, I snagged a telephone appointment at 1:45 p.m. on Sept. 30 — just under the wire. I had to cut an important doctor's appointment short to get home in time for the call. When the phone hadn't rung 10 minutes after the scheduled time, I felt nauseated from stress. It finally did. Had I been unable to sign up before the shutdown, receiving benefits of around $2,000 a month could have been delayed.

Since we were already on a bare-bones budget, we cannot tighten it. Savings must replace lost income. The only relief in sight is what we can create ourselves. However, I have already fired one salvo of emails to all our congressmen to express my disgust over their inability to keep the government afloat.

Read more of Sines’ story.
Shutdown plays politics with national parks

View gallery

.

D.C. Douglass

D.C. Douglass and his wife scrimped pennies, he says, for three years to pay for their twice-a-decade trip to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park where they vacation with his sisters and their families from Texas and Florida. But the government shutdown has closed 401 national parks, including the Smokies. Park roads and service facilities are unavailable, and visitors are being asked to leave immediately, according to ParkAdvocate.org. Renting two cabins for a week set his group back $6,000. Douglass writes:

I understand this is not a situation that is going to elicit much sympathy from government employees who are going to go without paychecks or Americans who are waiting for FHA mortgage approvals. But this ridiculous partisan spat is negatively affecting millions of Americans, and our illustrious Congress does not seem to care a bit. And it is costing me money.
I am writing this while sitting on the deck of a mountainside cabin in Wears Valley, Tenn., just outside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. My family comes from around the country to congregate here in the autumn every five years. My wife and I make the 10-hour drive from the suburbs of Detroit to hike, camp and enjoy the Smokies' magnificent fall color. We made our reservations nearly a year in advance. We saved our pennies for nearly three years.
Again, the cost is really not the object. It is the experience we relish, as I am now approaching 60, and the strenuous uphill hike to the lodge is getting more difficult with each passing year. But I still look forward to making the trip. Perhaps we will not make it this year after all, thanks to our uncompromising legislators. Not that they care.
Let me also say that I am not one of the 1 percent. I am not even close to it. This is a trip we save for all year, often bypassing other pleasures to be certain we the funds are available. I do not expect anyone to feel sorry for us.
Read more of Douglass’ story.
My husband won't get paid, but he’ll still work

View gallery

.

Kimberly Morgan

Kimberly Morgan’s husband works two jobs — one with the U.S. Naval Reserves and another as a civilian for Central Command in Tampa, Fla. — but he could be furloughed from one and not paid for the other, even though he’ll be working because he’s considered “essential.” She writes:

If they do break this loggerhead, the government may or may not pony up with his back pay. In essence, we will simply be surviving on whatever savings we have, because the government considers his job so vital and important, my husband will work a full eight-hour day, every day, without pay, for however long it takes.
And it gets better. He will not be permitted to use any leave or holiday time for the duration of the furlough. We're losing part of our retirement, too; for every missed paycheck, we're also missing contributions to our Thrift Savings Plan, a federal employee retirement program.
Additionally, this affects his second job entirely. If there's a government shutdown, he doesn't leave for the reserves, so we miss out on a couple hundred dollars for the lost drill pay.
This is pretty huge; we're a family of five, and while the economy in Tampa is improving somewhat, it's still not the cheapest place to live. We're both in our early 40s, and while we're still young enough to make up the lost ground, I'd rather it never came to this. He loves his job and I'm proud of the work he's doing ... which is more than I can say for some of our elected officials.
Read more of Morgan’s story.
Everyday tasks that much harder

View gallery

.

Robert Clark Young

In San Diego, Robert Clark Young has cared for five years for his infirm father, who needs government-issued IDs for doctor visits, emergency-room care and access to handicapped services. Young mailed off the necessary paperwork for a federal passport card, but with the government shutdown and a local office unfunded and unsupported, there’s no one to process the application. Young writes:

How long will the government be closed for business? Who can say? But I know one thing: Giving my father the daily care that he needs could be complicated if he lacks legal identification.
My father's HMO requires a valid photo ID before providing him with routine medical care. His catheter is changed once a month, for instance, and the scheduling puts him in different facilities with different nurses. What if he has no ID at the time of his appointment?
Over the past five years, my dad has been in the emergency room 12 times. He's always been asked for a photo ID.
Technically, we can't even use a handicapped parking space without my father being able to prove that he's the person the placard is assigned to.
Shutting the government down affects millions of Americans in ways large and small. I hope the Republicans in Congress will compromise on this matter, before the inconvenience to Americans becomes too great.

Meanwhile, we'll be trying to get my dad an ID card issued by the state of California. The Democrats are in charge here, and the state is open for business.