Despite the hassle, Kirkland feels fortunate toeven have subsidized day care.

"I'm very happy with day care," Kirkland says."It's helped me tremendously."

But not everyone enjoys Kirkland's benefits.

In Cambridge, 224 welfare families receive freechild care and 184 families are in transitionalchild care.

Still, 242 income-eligible Cambridge familiesremain on the waiting list, and over 13,000families across Massachusetts are in the sameboat.

For these families self-sufficiency is harderto achieve.

"Child care is absolutely essential," says JaneA. Norton of Cambridge Head Start Day Care."People can't leave their house if they don't havesomeone capable and trustworthy taking care oftheir children. Parents need to work to surviveand they can't do that without day care."

Got Health Care?

It's a Sunday afternoon typical of suburbanAmerica. Children play baseball on the street,twenty-somethings cruise around the Somervilleneighborhood in their parents' cars andgrandparents slowly sip lemonade on their porches.

"This is family," says Margaret, a singlewelfare mother, as she waves her arm before thebusy scene. "Everyone knows everyone else and weall grew up together. Now we have kids and ourkids play with each other."

When Margaret fell on hard times, her familyand neighbors advised her to seek public help atthe DTA office in Davis Square.

"I've worked full-time since I was fourteen,"Margaret says. "I never thought I'd end up as partof the [welfare] system. I was brought up to work,not take. I almost had to wear dark glasses and ahat to walk inside."

Margaret suffers from chronic brain seizures,crippling her ability to work. Her first attack,in 1995, came the day before her son's birthdayparty at Chuck E. Cheese.

"My mother found me face-down on the floor,unconscious," Margaret recalls. "I woke up atMount Auburn Hospital with two black eyes and anose bigger than Pinocchio's."

Margaret supervised 22 screaming four-year-oldsthe next day, but the seizures eventuallyprevented her from working a full-time job.