I can’t think of a clever title for this post, but it’s about money, where it disappears to, and how little of it I really have
This afternoon I got to thinking about all the things I have, and how few of them I actually own. When I say “own,” I mean “bought with money I earned myself.”
What is the most expensive thing I own? It’s not my apartment, even though that’s where most of my money goes—that belongs to the rental company. It’s not my car, which belongs to my parents. It’s not my computer, which I got as a gift from my parents three years ago when I started college. The same goes for my cell phone. Most of my furniture and kitchen appliances (the only exceptions being my “coffee table” and (ex-)TV cabinet, neither of which cost more than thirty dollars) belong to either my parents or the apartment complex. I bought my four-hundred-dollar PDA myself, but that was Christmas money (which we got last year in lieu of a bunch of presents).
As far as I can tell, the only things of any non-trivial value that I actually own are about half of my clothes and some of my books. I estimate that if you threw all the clothes and books I’ve bought since I started earning my own money into a pile, it would be worth maybe two thousand dollars. I’ve combed my apartment looking for the single most valuable item I own. If you don’t count “my closet” or “my bookcase,” the most expensive things I’ve bought appear to be shoes. The most I’ve ever spent on a pair of shoes is around seventy bucks. Ok.
This surprises me a little, for some reason, though I’m not sure what I was expecting. I’m 21, and I’ve only held down a “real” job (i.e., one that pays a decent amount of money (and that I actually turn in timesheets for, instead of working “for the fun of it,” as I did during school when I just couldn’t be bothered to fill out the paperwork)) for about a year. I guess it feels strange because I spend much more money than that, but nearly all of it goes toward things which are immaterial or evanescent. My largest recurring expenses (in order) are rent, gas, groceries, cable, and electricity*.
Beyond those, I really don’t spend that much. I put nearly everything on my debit card. Here’s where my money has gone in the last month, in reverse chronological order:
credit card balance, electricity, psychiatrist**, gas, groceries, Starbucks, credit card balance, pharmacy, gas, groceries, rent, Office Depot, gas, groceries, cable, gas, footie pajamas, groceries, books, gas, cable, gas, hurricane groceries, psychiatrist, gas
That’s pretty much it; I’m not real spendy. (At the moment I’m not real earny, either, so it all balances out.) I do pay for a few things with cash, but I never have to withdraw cash from my account because one of my tutoring jobs pays in cash, and the twenty bucks a week I get from that is more than enough to keep me in frappucinos and waffle fries.
Oh, and that credit card balance that I keep having to make payments on? Yeah, that’s me being stupid. The only credit card I have is from Old Navy, and it’s been nothing but trouble since I opened the account two years ago. I would charge clothes to it, fully capable of paying for them and intending to do so, but then I’d forget. At 19.8% interest and $25/month late fees, things went downhill fast. I haven’t used the card since June, but I wasn’t able to pay off the whole balance until an hour ago when, in planning this post, I pulled up my account page, which reminded me that I’d been paid this morning. Since rent isn’t due for another two weeks, I threw half of my paycheck at this damn credit card bill to make it go away. And it did. Phew!
I charged, at most, three or four hundred dollars’ worth of clothes on that card, but I’ve paid nearly twice that much on the account. Clearly, I am not the sort of person who should have a credit card, or at least not until I grow up a little***.
But back to “owning” things. The only thing I’ve ever bought which has required “financing” is a small chunk of my education****. What will my first “big” purchase be, I wonder? Not a house, for sure, or even a car. My lil Tima has probably got two or three years left in her, and my parents have offered to buy me one car after that, which is lovely of them. I think the next item I’ll buy requiring more advance planning than reading the back cover will either be a keyboard or an iPod. Most likely the latter, unless I decide I can wait until Christmas. So it’s not a car, but going from a $70 purchase to a $200 one is progress. Look at me, buying things like a grown-up! (Planning to buy them, anyway.)
I’m ridiculously lucky to have the chance to experience the fun and stress of living on my own and barely making enough money to live on****** without having to worry about *actually* going broke. If I ever got in too tight a spot, my parents would cover my ass, and everything would be ok. I’m proud, though, that I (unlike my brother) have NEVER asked my parents for money, and I intend never to have to.
Someday when I’m all grown-up and responsible I imagine I will reread this and find it quite amusing. I’ll probably want to pinch my past (current) self’s cheeks and poke gentle fun at her innocent ignorance of mortgages, stock portfolios, and whatever-the-hell else I’ll be dealing with at the time. I can’t wait; I heart my blog.
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* Hopefully these last two will switch places now that I’ve cancelled my TV service.
** My parents reimburse me for my medical bills, but I pay them out of my account because my dad says I can get some sort of tax deduction.
***Or unless I can set it up to automatically be paid in full every time they send a bill, which would make it essentially a debit card. I can do debit cards.
****Speaking of which, the six-month grace period on my student loans should have expired at least a month ago, but I haven’t heard anything from Sallie Mae since February. If they want their money back, they’ll have to ask for it*****.
*****Oh, and to all the high school students out there: APPLY FOR SCHOLARSHIPS. Scholarships are good. There are plenty of people out there who are just itching to give you free money. TAKE IT. Don’t just sit on your ass because you can’t be bothered to do the research and fill out the forms. All that Spider Solitaire might seem like fun now, but I promise you’ll regret it later; college is expensive.
******Technically, I’m probably not making *quite* enough money to live on, at least not at the standard-of-living I’ve got now. I pay MOST of my own bills, but my parents still cover my health insurance co-pays, my car insurance, and my cell phone bill (as part of our family plan).
Tags: miscellany