I Want This

I got this in my email this morning. And I want it. WANT it.

Usually, a situation like this would go down like this: Ah! Opportunity I really want but can't afford. Well, I do have $200 in my bank account. So what if that has to last me until next Friday? What will I need to buy next week? Nothing, I'm sure.

I'd call one of my other money dumb friends and they'd say, Do it! You've always wanted to take a glassblowing class. It's been your DREAM. My dream, I'd say. You're right! You only live once. I'll charge it, borrow from my mom, whatever I have to do to get my dream.

Well, I can tell you right now that my dream is to be financially stable. More than anything, I want to not have that claustrophobic feeling, those ropes of debt and cashlessness tied around me.

I have to get comfortable with my opportunity costs, which are anything you give up to pursue any other action. All those nights out, all those nice cloths, and, now, that glassblowing class I've always wanted to take.

Opportunity costs are always infinite. At any given time, you are not touring the wine country in Italy, you are not seeing the blossoms in Japan, you are not eating at the finest restaurant in NYC. It's only those things that are waved in our face that bother us, when someone invites us on a trip or when a coupon service offers us half-off something we still can't afford. Turn away, as quickly as you can and just don't think about it.

Hmm, Sounds Interesting

The 12-Step Money Dummy Program

1.  Get some opportunity, be it a flush of money, a job, anything that lets you breath for once, something that says, yes, finally, things are going to change. 

2.  Plan, in manic fashion. Less planning than frolicking in the thoughts of how life could be, thanks to this new, shiny pet of a chance. Make a budget with your new zeros. Make a graph of your savings rising ever higher into the distance of your bright future. Write it on your heart: This time will be different!

3.  Look at trips online, to Europe. You’re just looking. It doesn’t mean anything. Just that when you’ve got all this money saved, you want to know how much you’ll need before you can go to Europe. According to Excel, you’ll have $5,000 saved by this time next year. 

4.  Talk about your plans. Feel some embarrassment but don’t know why. Be anxious for life to unfold so that your beautiful plans may come to pass. 

5.  Get tripped up. “What happened?” you’ll wonder, weeks down the line. You fell off the wagon, forgot your budget because it was New Year’s or your birthday, all those crumpled receipts in your jeans’ back pocket. You’re not exactly sure how much you spent. 

6.  Don’t check your bank account. Mean to, but don’t get to it today, or tomorrow. Guess that you probably have enough, definitely should have enough, according to your rounded estimations made in your head, until the clerk hands your card back, denied, as you go yet again to buy coffee’s expensive French cousin, the latte, for $5 a cup. 

7.  Feel the burn, that inner heat that says trouble, as your computer loads the page. See red. Red. NSF. All the fun you had cost you that much plus a $35 fee every transaction. 

8.  Feel like crying, but don’t cry yet. Want to call out to someone: Help me. But the only thing you’d have to say is: “I did it again.” I did it to myself.

9.  Call your lenient friend who never holds you accountable. She says its ok. You’ll be all right. You’ll get out of this (as if it’s something that happened to you and not because of you.) 

10. Finally cry, after burning some rice, because you can’t afford to go out to the dinner all your friends are at. Can’t afford as in no money to be squeeze from any card, wallet or couch cushion. You’d charge it if you had the space. You can’t do anything right. You want to believe you can, but you seem to fuck up just about every time, even this time, which was going to be different. It only takes so long for fuck up to become a noun. 

11. Let your failures slip, to other people. “So you won’t be going to the Galapagos Islands next March?” “Naw.” Then you shrug. 

12. Get your hands on something cheap or free or chargeable that feels good. Squeeze the life out of it. Some good examples are: Pour the box wine in your mouth. Shove the whole doughnut in your mouth. Sleep with your ex. Think about your past failures, let them pile up in your mind. Face them, stand in their enormous shade. Lose all hope that it could ever be different. Know you shouldn’t think that way. Keep on keepin’ on.

REPEAT

I Would Do, Have Done, Anything to Organize My Bills

Grrrr. Uggghhh. Blaaaahh. 

Today was going to be the day that I bragged about my little Excel spreadsheet I use to organize my bills. How did I not notice that $136.82 never left my bank account? That's a money dummy. Money is not real to me. I either have numbers in my account or I don't. All that's in between -- the relationship between balances and dates -- baffles me. 

Anyway, this awesome excel spreadsheet goes like this: Bills down the left column, organized by due date, months across the top. I fill in the date every time I pay the bill. Every time I get paid, I look and see which bills are due before the next paycheck, and I pay them. What's left is spending money for two weeks. This works perfectly, when I'm on a roll.

As you can see by the little red triangles, I sometimes put new comments on the cells I fill in, and putting in the confirmation number of my transaction. I now know I have to do that every time. Air tight!

The blue titles to the left are hyperlinks right to the web sites to pay. Every month, I pay my mom $45 for the phone plan she has me on. Good thing moms don't have late fees!

In that same Excel file, there's a graveyard of other worksheets. There's a plan for paying my mom back all the money she used to pad my fall to rock bottom last year. There's the budget for the salary I was making before I decided to "follow my heart" and move to Seattle two months ago. It doesn't quite go with my waitress tips. There's a checkbook system, where I swore I would write down every expense and track them later in categories. According to my records, this attempt to save my spending died on 3/3/11.

When I see that I've been late, again, when nothing seems to be working, I just want to throw my hands up and forget it. But you just have to get up again, dust off the late charges, and try something else. This money thing isn't going away.

Events Will Suck Your Money

I thought I was prepared for yesterday's music festival. We had a spot nearby to drop off snacks and drinks, so that we wouldn't have to pay food stand and bar prices. So I made ants on a log to use up all my celery. I overpaid at a convenience store for 24 ounces of raisins and aluminum foil ($11.98 for both!) but oh well. 

Then our place fell through, and we just had to go. "Oh well," I say. Because inside, I want those fancy drinks and those awesome food stand hamburgers. 

Suddenly, I realize I'm spending money left and right. I realize I have no plan. I have no budget. I have no idea how much cash is in my wallet, crumpled into several little groups of bills. I buy drinks, I buy food, I buy a tank top from my friend's band to make him feel better about low sales. From my money spending tweets, which dropped off after a few drinks and had to be estimated from there, I see I spent about $40, even with my boyfriend buying a few rounds. This is a three-day festival. $40 a day isn't sustainable, especially since I'm taking a week and a half off work because my mom is coming here Tuesday. Another vacation I don't deserve.

So today, I will make a plan. I will count the money in my wallet before I go. I give myself $30. We'll see how it goes.

The Good Kind of $80 Shoes

Today's shoe purchase is brought to you by my high school economics teacher. He was a total pain in the ass, because he actually made us work and didn't put up with our bullshit. He's the kind of guy who would say, "Why would I pay $6 for two eggs at a restaurant when I can purchase the same amount of food for $1.57 at the grocery store?"

I remember being surprised the day he told us that his shoes cost $300. He said with confidence, "I work every day on my feet, these are good for back health and they help me feel good."

Thinking of it now, I can hear that it's totally the opposite of what I sound like when I rationalize a purchase. His is all analytical, mine is all emotional. "But I waaant it. But it's my birthday. But it's so pretty." My rationale is based on the coo-coo's nest in my head. Emotion on the front end and emotion after I buy whatever it is I'm buying. The ending emotion is usually regret.

But today, I spent $76.82 on Danskos. I've been thinking about this purchase for a while, unlike my normal impulse-fueled buys. I can look myself in the eye and say I'm buying these because I'm working as a waitress, and working in my favorite seafoam green Converse makes my back spasm with pain after a shift. It will improve my life more than $76.82.

This is maybe how my best friend thinks. She's the non-money dummy in my life. I remember when she  and I were making the same amount of money scooping ice cream as 14-year-olds, but she always seemed to be able to afford nicer things. It's the kind of decision process that I never used when I walked into a convenience store and out with $11 worth of candy and a Slurpee. My process was and is: Me want! Me have!

So, rationalizing purchases with rational arguments instead of emotions. There's a tip we learned today. When you want to spend money, call your most non-money dumb friend and ask him if he think it's worth the cost. Tell him how much money you have in the bank.

See, improvement...even if that purchase left $3.96 in my account. I'm depositing paycheck today! Cutting it too close, another symptom of money idiocy.

Cash is still money

Today I wanted another latte on the way into work. It's the day after my birthday (which is the excuse to spending money the day after your birthday.) I was tired and blah. I needed a latte. Usually, you can say you need something, and people don't question your word choice. They just believe you, and say, Well if you need a latte just get a latte. It's only $4. 

So I needed a latte, but I had already gotten one today. (It was the morning after my birthday, after all.) I saw a $5 bill on my dresser and thought: Oh good a five. In my mind, cash is like this free-for-all, like it doesn't matter because it's not on the permanent record of your bank account. You don't want to see "Starbucks" listed forty times on your bill, but if you find a ten in your laundry, nobody's gotta know. 

Cash is like confetti in my life, falling out of my pockets, found in other pockets, crumbled up in my purse, shoved willy-nilly into a wallet, uncounted. No wonder money leaves me. I treat it like it's worthless. 

Even though the purchase wouldn't show up on my bank statement, I knew I'd have to put it on my Twitter, as I have taken a solemn vow to do. I also know my best friends are reading this, the girls who have had to hear about my money problems since we were scooping ice cream for a living at age 14. In short, this blog experiment is working, because I didn't spend the $4. Hooray public shame.

Hey, I had a good birthday

I had a great birthday. Even though I wore a dress that everyone saw me in at a party last Tuesday, I had a great time. 

In the morning, I did go shopping with two lady friends, returned some $50 boots and wanted to use that money to get something else, maybe for that night and also as a shirt for a job interview I have on Friday. 

They asked for my id when I went to customer service, and I realized that I had lost my wallet. (Disorganization is one of the symptoms of a money idiocy.) So they just gave me store credit. 

But hey, thanks current fashion, for not tempting me to spend it. Can I ask when 10th-grader-trying-to-hide-her-pregnancy chic came into style? I found a half-poofy pink shirt, as if I were playing the curtains in the school play. I wanted something else fancy for dinner. Since all the dresses made me look like Ricky Lake in Hairspray, I went with the old dress from last Tuesday. 

There's something nice about not being able to buy perfection. Not the brand-new dress, not the expensive makeup. If we can spend enough money to think we can make life perfect, we get all flustered when life doesn't unfold perfectly. (Think prom.) It's like how Navajo weavers always leave one imperfection in their work, where they say the spirit can move in and out, not getting stuck (a concept I'd like to read more about). It's nice to embrace imperfection.

Birthday to me

Today is my birthday. What you do on your birthday is you stand back and think you can get some snapshot of your life: there's my at 6, there's me at 19, here's me at 29. Maybe that's why I tend to ruin my birthdays. Maybe that's why I haven't slept.

Money can play a big role in setting the scene of the life we want to see. When we're looking to define ourselves, we can feel a little better when that person is wearing a new dress. But it's my birthday, we say. It's still you who has to pay the credit card bill.

I was thinking about spending money on this birthday. I made a rule years back that every birthday, I would buy myself a new dress, as if I could purchase some symbol of respect and love for myself. And here it is, another year where I can't really afford one. All I have to say is: But it's my birthday. The king of all excuses. Used only once every 365 days, though you have 364 more you'll think up, until next year comes around and you can't afford a new dress then, either. 

It's my birthday. I deserve it. 

What if for my birthday, I deserve the self-respect to live a life of peace instead of financial desperation? What if I give myself the power to say, I deserve to feel loved and ok, even in a shirt I've worn fifty times and jeans with holes from wear? What if for my birthday, I grow up and leave my ego back in kindergarten? 

I'll work on that one.

FMGS! (F My Grocery Shopping)

While trying to decide if I was going to go to the fancy Trader Joe's grocery store or the stinky QFC, I check my bank account and literally gasped.

$198.

Balls. balls. balls.

QFC here I come.

Oops did I spend $50 today?

You know when you commit to doing something, and then right in the middle you realize it's going to cost you twice as much as you thought it would?

God forbid we look cheap, right? Rather than say, "Hey guys, this is getting a little expensive," we'd whip out a credit card. "What's another $50 on there, anyway, right?"

That kind of happened today. We were going to have a crab bake. Eating at home. Hooray. Cheaper option, right? Maybe just $20?

Well, we get the crab, and it's nearly $20 a crab. There's $55 on my card, and my friend gives me $20 for his. I get my boyfriend's. We go back and forth on expenses, but honestly most go forth to him. I'm a waitress right now. 

Notice I don't want to say: "I'm a waitress." Period. I instead say: "Right now," as in: This isn't who I really am. As in: I'll get back on my feet some day, and I will feel like a worthy human again.

Back at the crab bake, we don't have a stock pot big enough. I look for one at the store: $45. I fantasized for a bit about it being worth it because think of all the wonderful stews and soups I could make in the winter. Then back to reality. When the hell am I ever going to cook soup for 15 people? I've maybe cooked soup 5 times in my life before.

We go thrift store shopping. For cooking ware. Gross, right? This is what you have to do, because you're terrible with money and you've put yourself in a hole and you can't just spend $45 on a crock pot.

The used pot is $12.75 plus tax, with a spout, some rust spots and pictures of clams on it. I wash it twice and am glad I have it. Maybe I'll cook clams for 15 one day. 

I went for the cheaper option, yes, but all in all I spent about $50 today, counting that vanilla latte and muffin I had this morning. $6.88. 

I'm trying to live off of $100 of spending money a week, not counting groceries. I can't be having $50 days.

But it felt like a special day. The friends we had lunch with are moving soon, I hadn't had crabs in years, and it's my birthday this week. Or is it maybe that I'm always just full of excuses about why, just this time, I get to splurge?

Hi. I'm a Money Idiot

I'm a money idiot. 

This means that I've paid more in NSF charges than I have for the things I was trying to purchase in the first place. This means that I can't go in to a gas station and just buy gas, I must leave with a candy bar or a snazzy pair of glasses. This means that I'm currently being charged 28 percent interest on beers I bought two years ago. This means that I know which ATMs will give you cash in increments of ten dollars instead of twenty, for all those times I've had about $14 and needed spending money. This means I can't say no, and will say yes without doing the math.

Being a money idiot is not about being broke. It's about missing some piece of your brain that you know other people developed somehow, that thing that says, "You don't have money for that," no matter how cute it is or how hot it makes you look. We money idiots say, "I need it!" We don't have the money for it, of course, but these nice people who work at places like Visa and Mastercard will loan us the money, because they know how badly we need things.

It's a tough world out there for money idiots. The credit industry gives us enough rope not only to hang ourselves, but to tie and quarter ourselves. We're told as many as 5,000 times a day that we need more and more.

My goal is to break the cycle we live in, to go from credit to savings, (tempted to put a ha ha here, but I will not! This is serious.)