Tuesday, Jul. 29, 2003
Cabbage at WalMart, posted at 11:35 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Tonight, I went into the Super WalMart with the grocery money that my parents gave me, and saw that cabbage was on sale, 2 for 88 cents. Cool, I thought, I'll get two. The cashier, however, weighed them and it came up to $3.22. I didn't say anything to her, but instead I walked over to the cabbage display and saw that the sign was actually a huge 2 and a huge 88 cents, and a tiny font after the 2 that said "lb." The cabbages were 2 lb for 88 cents. My eyes filled with tears as, once again, I have proven just how ridiculously incompetent I am with money.I'm falling apart, people.
I then went home, and realized that I felt like crap and ended up passing out for a couple of hours. I haven't been sleeping well, the ball of financial stress grumbling in my stomach, and the four or five hours of sleep I've gotten a night since I came to Michigan has not been sufficient.
It was such a day today. It started off well, as my dad and I enjoyed a game of golf, my first ever. I was just he and I, and provided some good bonding moments. Then, later, he made an innocuous remark about knowing that I've had some financial difficulties, and then I laid it out for him. I wrote down all the numbers - the $46,300 I owe in student loans, the $8000 I owe in credit card debt (a conservative estimate), the $10,000 I still owe on my car, the $1900 I bring home a month, the $250 rent, the $392 car payment, the $300 car insurance payment, the $100 heat/electricity payment, the $500 I paid last year every month on credit card debt, the $100 a month on groceries and laundry. I asked him for advice. The conversation went as well as expected, considering I'm a major fuckup and he's the polar opposite. I was glad I finally got it off my chest to him, and, who knows, maybe something good will come of it. I'm going to figure out what I can do with my car, which I paid $12,700 on (a very good deal for the car) but have incurred $3200 worth of damage on that insurance will not cover (the air bags that came out) so the value has decreased markedly.
He also had many things to say about the Italy trip, and he's right. But I also told him that I would have let this go for a few more years if I hadn't taken that trip. Because I never want to take a trip again in which I'm always looking over my shoulder and worrying about what will happen during my return, because someday I want to be able to responsibly take off for Europe, I decided to finally start opening the stack of bills I have that I ignore. He told me that it was something that a teacher would say. Hmmm. Also, by the way, lest you think I've become a uni-minded person, with my only concern about $$... I think I like Howard Dean, but am concerned about his pro-death penalty stance. That one of my biggest social issues. It still baffles me that we live in a country in which killing another human being is legal.