The Damage, the Clean-up Plan

 I got my first paycheck today. I just worked 3 days on the first pay period, but it was almost as much as my bi-weekly paycheck from the wine bar. I'm determined to pay my rent. My boyfriend says, don't worry about it, that I can pay him when I can. 

I can now, it just means being as broke as I've been. But that's what I need to be doing, pretending to still be broke. Although I'm dying to shop at an actual clothing store, not a second-hand store, among other niceties, I have so much damage to undo. Although I'm dying to have clothes that aren't too small, because someone else gave them to me, shirts that I have to keep pulling back over my muffin tops and down my wrists, I have to stay strong. I've been broke for more than a year, and the emergencies have gone on the mom account. My boyfriend paid for us to move in to our apartment, and I was shocked when I added up how much I have to repay. 

The trick for the next, oh, probably three months is going to be this: pretend I'm as broke as I have been over the last year. I started today while I was looking for work clothes (which I legitimately need). I found a shirt I liked, a going-out shirt. It made me look cute and shiny. $8. I said nope. Not on payday. If I still have spending money two weeks from now, then maybe. But, according to my calculations, I have $183 until next payday (with the addition of my last wine bar paycheck next Friday, which I'm guessing will be at most $100).

Monthly Money Check-in
	Type	Account	10/1/11
Short-term stuff	Cash is money too	Cash	$22	- I always see cash as money that broke free and gets to run wild. Not true.
	Bank Accounts	Bank of America Checking	$34	- This is my main checking
		Achieva Checking	$75	- This is another bank account I have from back home. Direct access for mom deposits.
	Credit Card Debt	Bank of America Credit Card	-$1,163	- The big credit card
		Student Credit Card	-$435	- The little credit card I've had for 10 years. I was going to pay it off right after summer…
	Embarrassing Debt	Mom	-$1,517	- With this week's $650 plane ticket home for thanksgiving, we're in the three digits again
		Boyfriend	-$2,150	- Holy fuck how did that happen?
		TOTAL	-$5,156
Long-term stuff	Retirement	New York Life	$5,828	- This is the only thing I do right, financially. I need more accounts with laws against withdrawing.
		Edward Jones	$1,000	- Another little retirement fund from my college job.
	Student Loan	AES	-$14,434	- College… worth every penny
	Big Crazy Debt	Mortgage	-$145,000	- My house debt. I can't even think about this or I'll lose all hope.

Can't Buy Me Life

"The objects of the world act as intoxicants. Money is opium. Man to woman, and woman to man, is wine. Position is Ganja. Power is brandy. Landed property is champagne."

-Sri Swami Sivananda

Last week I moved to a new apartment and started a new job. There you go, here's a life.

I took over an apartment from a friend who had lots of nice things. She moved to Asia. Now I have lots of nice things. Someone who came over left two drips of red wine on my white table, which isn't even technically one of my nice things. It's a door on two crates. All the same, I leapt across the table to clean it. These friends have been back from Peace Corps for only a few weeks. Can you tell I've been back a year?

I told my friend I was getting sucked in to the materialism. Especially working at a place frequented by people who can afford to drop $80 a night on wine and cheese, I have a desire for crisper clothes, a nicer haircut, shoes that aren't splattered.

Now I'm going to have money. Soon. I'm going to be making a lot of money. A lot of money for me. A lot of money for the world.

I just Googled "average world salary", and this is what I found. You put in your salary and it tells you if you're rich or not. After hitting Enter, I stared with my mouth open for a while.

I don't feel like I'm there. I feel somewhere toward the left. Our poor little monkey brains. We have no way of truly appreciating that we are rich. I bet if we put pictures of starving Africans on billboards instead of Calvin Klein models, we'd all appreciate life more.

"The ego wants to want more than it wants to have." Eckhart Tolle wrote that. No matter what you get, you'll still want more.

I have this opportunity, in the form of this money. Don't fuck it up, I say to myself, which somehow seems the surest sign that I will fuck it up.

My friend some Peace Corps, in whom I confided that I'm being sucked in to the materialism, said to me, "My two years in Peace Corps were the happiest two years of my life, and I had the same clothes the whole time." I'm trying to remember that. They were mine too. 

This Panic, Is Why

Whenever I get my hands on money, I let it slip through my fingers. No more excuses, and this is why. 

This panic, rock-hard in my chest. 

My renters called. There's a leak in the house. A pipe leak. I'm 3,000 miles away. I'm $300 in the bank. I called a plumber, but if they call me back and say anything more than 300, I literally don't know what I'm going to do. I can't pay in tears. 

Why do I forget this panic so easily, as soon as I have some money? This is an emergency, without an emergency fund. I looked up my credit card, and I have $44 worth of space. I tried to increase my credit limit, putting in the annual income of my new job. $50,000. 

$50,000. More than I've ever made in my life. A number that already has me saying, I have money, I'm fine. I will have money, if I'm careful. If I don't do what I've always done. Already a month and a half of my new income is owed to others. I'm already dreaming of new clothes, nice meals, nice things in my new apartment, when I have Christmas travel coming up and a lot of saving to do.

I need to remember my dream I'm having right now, of not having this heavy rock weighing me down. The dream of the comfort of living within my means. Remember, for the love, remember.

Crisis Mode, How to Change Apartments and Jobs

I've had all week off as the owners of my wine bar got married in a lavish, beautiful, 3-day wedding. As always after a vacation, I feel a panic. I have no idea how the next month is going to work. As usual during these panic situations, I've had my head in the sand, acting like everything is ok.

Looking back, I realize I spent about $200 on just clothes and jewelry for this wedding. Yipes.

I'm moving into this apartment and my boyfriend is already going to have to front the first, last and deposit. Then we owe rent again on the first. My next paycheck is probably going to be about $40 with all this time off. I start my new job on the 21st, but I probably won't get paid for that until God knows when. It's my sister's birthday, and once again, I can't really afford to get a gift for someone I love.

What to do? My thoughts turn to the bank of Mom.

This is what I need to replace with an emergency fund. Instead of running to my mom, I need my own cash flow to grease the wheels of life's changes. I'm just waiting to ask her. She won't say no, but what if she did? I'd be f'ed.

Holy Crap, I got a job (And the Books that Helped Me Get Hired)

After dozens of cover letters, after all the different versions of my resume, after all the Craigslist hunting, I actually got a job. I've been looking for 5 months.

In my desperation, I got cheesy. I went to the library, found out what color my parachute was, checked out all the career books. They gave me hope.

How I finally got my job was through a staffing agency. But these books gave me the knowledge to hone in my search and do it right...after doing it wrong for a long time.

The Overnight Resume: Great tips on getting your resume to look better than everyone else's.

The Six Reasons You'll Get the Job: A great book to help you view yourself from the employer's eye.

The Next-Day Job Interview: I felt so much more confident in the interview after reviewing this book not just the night before, but for three days. I felt like a rock star and hence rocked the interview.

The best part was returning them all to the library after I didn't need them anymore.

Feeling Luxury

The day started at Nordstrom. The mission: one strapless bra. For you men out there, a cheap strapless bra feels like a vice grip on your ribs, falling slowly all night while you try to dance.

To buy cheap or to buy quality. That is the question. I saw in Peace Corps as the locals were forced to buy stuff Made in China that only looked like the American version. It broke in two weeks, everything half-rigged. Everything bought twice.

“You just have to get an $80 one,” a trusted friend said. Could it be that by spending money, you save money?

My fashion go-to sister-in-law suggested going to Nordstrom first, at least to get fitted. I have a gift certificate there. The nice girl named Kathleen asked me my name, measured my boobies, brought me bras by Chantelle and Calvin Klein. The Chantelle one ($85 with tax) felt like an anti-gravity device, floating around me. Ah, yes, this is what $80 buys you. The Calvins were not as nice. I put the Chantelle on hold.

Then we went to Nordstrom Rack. No one asked my name. We went to a basement room with racks to be picked over like the corpse of last year’s fashions. I found a Calvin bra, originally $40, now just $18. It was ok, better than normal. It felt a little like the vice on my ribs, but better than the flimsy black thing I had at home that I swore I’d never wear again.

Lastly we tried Ross. Clothes shoved on racks. Fallen clothes lying on the floor. Crying babies. We were greeted on the way in by the stares of the uniformed Loss Prevention Officers. I missed Kathleen.

I ended up with the $18 Calvin. I tried it on for a test run before the wedding I planned to wear it to. I was walking around the house with it on, and I realized: I don't want to feel like this. Whatever experience you're having, overlayed with the grip of this thing around you. I took it off and breathed a sigh of relief. It had only been 15 minutes. Maybe they'll take it back.