Tuesday, Aug. 05, 2003
Freefall, posted at 11:59 a.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com I did some research yesterday on car repo's, and it's definitely something that would suck. They'd take my car, sell it at an auction, and apply the amount to the amount I owe. I'd still owe the difference, and it would be on my credit that I had a car repo, which is one of the worst things other than bancruptcy. I'd still probably owe $8K on the car, which I'd take years to pay off, and I wouldn't even have a car to drive to go with that debt.I guess that means I've got to fight and claw my way towards $392 by Friday. Since my roommate moved out and screwed me over and will not pay rent, that means my rent check will not clear, and I'm thinking about calling my landlord, explaining it to her, and applying that money to my car loan. She's probably already deposited it, though, so I'd be charged the bounced check fee. I wish I had a credit card to put it on, but I haven't had one in years, but I got a pre-approved thing in the mail earlier this summer that I sent in just for emergency sake. But apparently I get denied from even pre-approved cards now: I got my denial notice yesterday.
I keep wondering how far I have to bottom out before things start looking up. I've filled out 18 job applications this summer, including 5 yesterday, and have heard nothing back, despite calling them back. I have to drive to Michigan on Thursday, and my car is scheduled to be repossessed on Friday, and my insurance expires on Saturday, and I have no idea what I'm going to do. I'm scheduled to drive people up and around Michigan, but can't do it without insurance. I've worked a lot this week here at school, and the money will start folding into my account in a while, but right now is a problem.
I keep thinking about the word redemption lately. I need it, badly. My mind is so uniformly set on this financial problem, and it keeps snowballing. I feel like I'm finally owning up to it - out of necessity, but I'm still owning up to them - yet the world seems not only not to give a shit, but it seems to keep placing obstacles in my path. I keep trying to look at those obstacles as stepping stones, not stumbling blocks, to a greater understanding of money and the ramifications of it. But I fucking get it. I don't know why bad things continue to happen, like I already don't feel like hell, like the guilt already isn't seeping into everything I do, where friends are asking me what's wrong and the tiny things I look forward to everyday are shrinking into nothingness.
I went to the bar yesterday for Bill's birthday, and everyone asked me why I was drinking water. Trying to get these last 20 pounds off, I say. I just hate that uncomfortable silence that comes up when I tell someone just how bad off I am. I was tired and not very fun. I'm at school now, just done with our meeting, and am going to wait around until 2 or so and try to get a free workout in the gym downstairs. That might cheer me up, especially since I feel like I'm ballooning, even though the scale doesn't say I am. Since I've been surviving on beans since I got home, it seems that I would be losing weight, anyway.
The more I think about it, the happier I am that I didn't teach summer school this summer. If I had continued to live paycheck to paycheck over the summer, just like last summer, I probably would have lived this way for another year, or more, without doing anything about it. Now, I'm just sort of in a freefall, wondering where the force of gravity will lessen, allowing me to grab a hold of something. I keep thinking about next month. About how if my car is repo'd, then I'd be able to walk to school, but I wouldn't be able to have a second job because I wouldn't be able to get to it, unless it happened to be close or on Baltimore's crummy bus lines.
****
One of the crummy parts about ending a relationship with someone with whom you were incredibly close, and with whom music was a driving force of the friendship+more, is that the music that the two of you used to listen to has new meaning. The song of the last three days is Dar Williams' "February," a song she used to hate, but was always my favorite Williams ballad - a deeply metaphorical and evocative look at a love gone bad. I turn it up at the part where Williams' voice elevates an octive, during the conversational part where the two lovers are talking about a crocus, and my eyes fill with tears, thinking about missing her, then to anger, thinking about how she let me down more than anyone ever has. ***** PS: You know, I wish my journal would start getting happy again too...