I am sorry to kidnap this article but it does lead into a segway that I have been itching to get some help on. I have student loans and such but I also have only two classes to go before I can graduate. I owe the school some money, I have been paying them back diligently, but it seems as though I am paying more interest than anything else. I qualify for financial-aid, more than enough to pay what I owe and for my last two classes. I have a small income, less than $20000 annually and I do not have sufficient credit for a private loan. I have tried to borrow with a co-signer but have been denied. I spoke to a counselor and she said that this situation to happens to only 5% of students. I have been applying for scholarships but have not had any luck. Does anybody have any alternative suggestions that can help my search? I go to a private school and I have no cooperation there;The business office will not respond to calls and emails and my advisor blatently said that if I cannot pay, then she will not help me. I need help - I am frustrated and have been waiting to graduate since 2003. Thanks for listening.

Nah, I'm kidding. I'm actually touched by how thoughtful everyone is. Although there are some folks who are, er, um, a tad draconian in their views, and make me tremble in my somewhat overpriced Converse sneakers, lest they take me to task for my financial sins...

Meanwhile, Kat brought up an EXCELLENT topic. (Thanks, kat.) To wit:

PS--Hey Mia, how about an article about "life start-up" costs for all of us who are graduating college at the end of the month? I'm trying to build a budget, but it's hard to think of all the little things you need for cooking, cleaning, etc... Thanks, I enjoy reading your articles.

I emailed my editor tonite to see what he thinks of the topic. but i loved it so much i wanted to put it out there for us all to chew, opine and reminisce over.

Remember the shock of setting up your own household? i vividly recall my own astonishment when my roommate and i bought everything from mops to dishes to cleaning products--and how quickly it all added up. all this stuff i'd taken for granted! suddenly i was pinching paper towels and soap and sponges from my folks when i went back home for visits.

would love to get thoughts and advice and fun memories from recent and not-so-recent grads about those start-up life costs.

MSN will be switching us over to a new system this month. it won't be here on Spaces, and it won't be a bloggish format. It will be, as I understand, more of a message board, where we can all have several conversational threads running at the same time! yay!!!

So that's all the info I have now. As soon as I know more, I'll let you know. mia

meanwhile i wanted to get back into the thread introduced by Redsonya about what happens when a spouse loses their job, or has to take a lesser job or can't work or gets laid off, etc.

i'm in a similar situation, although the causes are different than what other folks brought up--like immigration. my husband bartends and has finished a novel, which he still hopes to sell--and he is also hoping to get into grad school for the fall. but the point is, he hates bartending and yet because he's done only that for so long, he's having a hard time now segueing into more meaningful, more lucrative work. and yes, he has been quite depressed about being "stuck." he feels his choice to bartend while he wrote--which seemed like a good tradeoff once upon a time--may have painted him into a corner. i can't say too much more; i think this is about as comfortable as he'd feel if he read this. but there's more, as you can imagine.

it's very hard for men and women to get used to the new world financial order, which is to say: there is no financial order. anna, one of the WIR you never hear from cuz she's "wicked busy," as she would say, ;-)--she has a stay at home husband. he doesn't work right now. she brings home the bacon. period. it's a totally 1950s arrangement--in 21st century terms. is it odd? not when you consider that that's how large chunks of the world have done things for centuries.

still, i think of my husband's sense of despair--and my own confusion about how i'm "supposed to feel" about our situation--and i realize i don't know what the answer is. i believe my husband is on the right path now, trying to get into school to make a career shift. i also believe he will publish his novel. i tell him i have faith in him. and meanwhile, remind myself that while life would be easier if he was a bigger earner, SO WHAT? so i also try to practice what Kala described (sorry for such a long quote, but i like the smooch part ;-):

"It is hard not to let money or lack of it define us in this society. But that's exactly where we need to be most vigilant--if it takes telling yourself and one another that you are good, worthy people trying your best like everybody else, then repeat that a hundred times a day. You cannot internalize other peoples' judgements, or dominant cultural messages that judge your worth by your possessions, jobs, money, etc. etc. If that requires turning off the television, not watching commercials, so be it! (I mute them or use that time to wash a plate or two, or do little increments of cleaning, or smooch:-) because I hate hate hate how loud and ugly some commercials are in telling me what I need to be doing with my life and my money!)"

Well, for those of you who read my attempt to psych myself up to address the raise issue with my boss--I have to tell you that the most embarrassing thing happened.

As some of you read the other day, I got my new contract from my boss last week and couldn't figure it out. he went on vacation, so I couldn't discuss it with him. It looked like a big raise in pay for the column...but a big reduction in pay for blogging...and i was miffed and pissy and righteous.

Then yesterday, my editor got back from vacation and I finally had a long conversation with himr, and he explained (drum roll, please) THAT I'D MISREAD THE CONTRACT.

Uuuuuuuuuuuggggggggggh.

Well, I was overjoyed--because it was ultimately a really terrific raise (and I'm beyond grateful). But talk about having egg on my face! After five or ten minutes of discussion with my editor--which went around in circles because he couldn't understand what I didn't understand, and I didn't understand what he was trying to tell me--THEN he finallly says: did you read the contract?

So i went and looked at the contract again and if it's possible to physiologically burst into embarrassment--I did. "I'm turning so red right now," I said to him. He just laughed. Luckily we were speaking by phone, so he couldn't see me bang my red, red face on the wall.

So, all's well that ends well. But on a financial level, I had to ask myself: What was going on? Did I have such low expectations that I couldn't see or grasp that it was GOOD NEWS? Apparently so! It was right there in print! To what extent are my own negative assumptions--negative programming?--coloring my view of my financial life? Do I put hurdles in my own path?

Am I getting too existential?

Anyway, this was a great thing to have happened because it will completely change the way i approach the editor who does my other column--I have to negotiate a raise and time off with him as well. I'll just go into the situation with a lot more emphasis on the positive.

Well, as some of you may have noticed, I did NOT log on to the comments board of the Cost of Raising Kids post (now waaaaaay down there). That's because about 80 people had commented the last time I looked--and frankly I didn't want my blood pressure to take another hit.

Ever since i wrote that column many weeks ago--which was meant as a curious and respectful exploration of how one finally makes the leap into parenthood--I have gotten the most horrific hate mail. People telling me i don't deserve to be a parent. People telling me that if i think "like that" i should sit home and count my filthy lucre rather than poison some child's life. One person said I sounded like the type who would throw a baby in a dumpster.

Horrible. Unfeeling. Judgmental. Narrow-minded. Vicious. Clearly most of those people never even finished reading the whole article before ripping into me. If they had, they would have seen the conclusion I reached.

Thankfully, I've also gotten a lot of supportive and understanding letters. And i thank anyone who did so--and not just because they were smart enough to click to page 2.

What I wrote, I wrote in a spirit of questioning. In the world gone as crazy as it is, especially with regard to financial things--in a world in which a six-figure income like my husband's and mine feels perilously small against the demands of life at times (not all times, thanks to this blog!)--how can you not stop and ask what having a child will cost? it's not to say you'll ever have all the answers...it's not to say the math alone should be the basis for one of the most important decisions you'll ever make. but it seems essential to me, when weighing this most life-altering decision--possibly even more important than deciding to marry my husband!--that I examine what the impact will be--emotionally and financially.

Normally I'd leave this post open for comments, but I don't want to reignite the debate. If you'd like to share a thought that hasn't been said, you're welcome to. But I'll try to limit the comments to about 25 (if there are even that many), so things don't get out of hand. After some stupid commentator wrote a piece about me today, I decided maybe I deserve a chance to respond, since I haven't already. That's the main reason I decided to finally say something. Thanks for listening, Mia

So I just have to vent a wee thing that just happened to me--and it connects back up with Jen2's point.

I was trying to set a date to have dinner with a friend. She proposed a place we've gone in the past that's pretty pricey. So I said: You know it's just too expensive right now, i'd rather go there when it's a treat.

Perhaps I'm overreacting, but I'd swear the tone in her voice changed when i said those three revealing words: "It's too expensive."

"That's a little pricey." "We can't afford that right now." "Let's go somewhere cheaper." "That's out of my price range." "That's not really within our budget." Why does there have to be a stigma--or let's just say tension--associated with admitting you have some financial restraints?

I can't remember if it was Jen2 or someone else who indicated that these social situations can put you in a bind. You feel like you can't say anything, you're just supposed to keep up. I used to feel that way too--until I started saying honest words like those above. (Interesting: I just typed "uncomfortable" and changed it to "honest". See? It's hard to give yourself credit for practicing financial sanity!)

It is uncomfortable to admit these things, but as my own sociological experiment, I am trying to see how far I'm willing to go.

Another friend was suggesting my husband and I buy some real estate in their neighborhood, which is WAY BEYOND OUR MEANS--and it made me angry cuz she must know that, simply based on where we are living now. What--we are living in a funky walkup cuz we're so bohemian? Really--we can afford a 3-bedroom coop like the one they have, but we're just too artsy for that? What was she thinking? So I looked at her and simply said: We can't afford the area you live in.

She looked really uncomfortable that I was so honest, but I HAD to say it. I wasn't going to sit there and pretend that we could afford something just to keep up a pleasant conversation. (To give my friend credit, she said what she did in order to keep up our bond, and many women bond over being in similar circumstances; we're less inclined to want to admit differences, because that causes strife.)

These moments are difficult, but I'm increasingly willing to engage in them, especially as I contemplate what the fallout is when I don't! Which is to say (and forgive me because I know I've said something similar a few months ago): What if we were all more honest about our finances, especially in social situations? Wouldn't it then create more of a climate of financial honesty and accountability? Case in point: The friend who proposed the pricey restaurant is dating a guy with major financial issues. She was just telling me about them the other day!

I'd like to think that when I said my DH and I couldn't afford that place, perhaps it reminded her that we all should stop pretending, b/c her SO can't afford it either.

And when we're more honest, we're more likely to do stuff we can all afford--without shame or stigma.

You know, I straddle the fence when it comes to supersition, but i must say: the old saying about how 'trouble comes in threes' is a little uncanny at times, isn't it?

of course now i can't even remember what Trouble #1 and #2 were, because Trouble #3 has been such a whammy.

my DH and i own (owned?) a 1999 subaru legacy, which we paid cash for two years ago. we paid the book value, about $7500, because it was in great condition and subarus tend to last. (our previous car had been an aging Tercel, bless its little engine--and we wanted something a little more sturdy.)

i'll spare you all the excruciating car details, but basically, the radiator...anyway...it ended up being a problem with the head gaskets. lord have MERCY. ugh. for those of you unfamiliar, a head gasket problem is the kiss of death. esp. with the aluminum gaskets these subarus have, apparently. who knew? WE WOULD HAVE TO REPLACE THE WHOLE ENGINE.

i just want to cry thinking about it. because as i said, this was Trouble #3. We had already shelled out a bunch of money for 2 other things, whatever they were. clearly the car trauma has taken a toll on my brain. anyway, so now we are in that horrible position of HAVING to buy a car. and this is where our savings from the 60% Solution are supposed to protect us...and while yes, we have enough saved to buy another used car, that would pretty much kill our emergency cushion.

ideally, we should have been building up savings on all fronts for years now (i.e. both for emergencies and for long-term savings like cars and boilers), so that a replacement car--which is an inevitable expense at some point for most Americans--wouldn't set us back. but quite honestly, we had just recovered our equilibrium from buying the subaru!

so now we are facing the fact that we may have to take out a car loan. WHEN THE LAST THING ON EARTH I WANT IS ANY MORE !@#$% DEBT.

or we could lease. or we could try to buy a very cheap car in new mexico, where my dad lives and cars are cheaper and not beaten down by east coast winters, which we are seriously considering. (imagine: buying in NM and driving it back to NY! but it may be worth it...) Anyhoo...we are just starting to do research--OH, and found out on a website with 350 other furious owners that 1999 Subaru Legacy models are prone to this exact problem!--so if anyone has thots...I'd be very grateful. my DH and i aren't experienced car buyers. my family ALWAYS buys used; his family ALWAYS leases. hah.