March Debt Check-in

$2,000 (Credit Card)
$5,380.00 (C Car Loan)
$6,739.94 (J Car Loan)
$2,4340.00 (J Gov't Loan)



TOTAL: $14,459.94

Result: Decreased debt by $2,528.03 this month.

student loan debt:

 $62,319.73
 $31,271.56

= $93,269.86  $93,591.29
 

Increased $321.43, Damn you, student loans.

Dream Home

This is my realistic dream home. As in, it's not little hut in Tahiti or a gorgeous renovated sugar mill plantation  on an island or something. It's an actual home in a place I am interested in actually living and the price is not out of control.

Why, you ask?

I love windows. And sunlight. And a great view.

I can imagine myself here so easily. 

Sigh. 

I would snap this baby up so fast if student loans weren't a concern.

Fair.

Not Your Average Male: I Hate New England

This is not J's blog (since he doesn't have one), but it does pretty much sum up everything he has ever said about his experience with New Englanders. 

Serfdom

Good news today: Took a pregnancy test just to confirm and it was negative. I can't even think about bringing a kid into our situation.

Bad news today: I have officially gained 10lbs. since moving here and we got a bill from the IRS on our 2011 taxes. I believe that was the year J's military buddy who *claimed* tax experience handled our return. We now owe $612.

And another $800 for this year's filing.

And the government charged J for an "overpayment" on the military bonus he received when he first joined the military, which currently has a balance of $2,400.

We owe the gov't $3812.

Also, just looked at my student loans. In the past three months, we have paid $2,728. My balance has only gone down $743.25.

My job is unstable, he'll be out of school in the summer which means no more BAH payments and the loans will kick in.

I thought living here would mean that we would really be able to make a dent in our financial burden, but I really can't see a way out. I don't even think we could afford to get an apartment anywhere, never mind the pipe dream of someday owning our own home or having a family.

I don't know that I'm making any kind of difference in my job, I don't talk to friends anymore because I'm always so stressed or exhausted, my family relationships are becoming worse by being so close...

Honestly, thank God for my husband and my dog because otherwise, right now, this life feels like it was wasted on me. I feel beaten down and a thousand years old and I hate everything. All I can see is that the rest of my life will be dedicated to struggling to get by and by the time we see light we'll have nothing to show for it.

There is a difference beween being poor and being in debt. Being poor, there's some hope that a lucky break or working a little harder could help you break out. Being in debt is modern-day serfdom, where I am supposed to work and work and work for someone else's gain for, in my case, another 20 years. I will be around 45 before I will feel like I'm allowed to even look up.

I wish I had known this before going to college. I know that it was my mistake, but I honestly did not understand how loans worked, how much the bill would be, nothing. I truly didn't get it at all and I was too stuck in the peer pressure of what school you went to being a mark of how good you are and how successful it would make you. I just had no idea the reality of the situation when I signed into debt slavery.

It. never. ends.

It never ends.

Spring in New England

This weekend looked like this:

Ugh, Spring in New England 2013.

But also like this:

 

Shrimp Corn Dogs. I've never had a corn dog of any kind before; we saw these in Trader Joe's and decided we needed to have them. Turns out, they're delicious!

Footsie

My husband is sleeping on our sectional couch while I'm on the other side watching The Proposal.

He has grabbed my foot and won't let go. I love that he reaches for me in his sleep, even if it's only to grab my right foot.

<3 p="">

My "Situation"

I'm sorry that, when I'm living in MA, this blog turns into an outlet of rage, frustration, and general unhappiness.

I know that I'm unhappy here. I don't know how much of it has to do with living with my parents, much as I love them, "familiarity breeds contempt" and "distance makes the heart grow fonder" are the best phrases to describe this situation.

I am extremely grateful that they have given us a place to stay where we pay a much lower rent than the norm around here. I am grateful that we have our own situation and we are not all living on one floor.

The problem is, being grateful and being happy are not the same. Once we move, wherever it is we land, I need to remember all the bad because I tend to put a postive, rosy filter on everything once I no longer have it/ am in that stage. This is why I went back to relationships that didn't work. This is a chronic issue for me and I want to remember exactly how I felt at this point in life so I have no regrets once we move on.

1. My relationship with my mother becomes very strained when we are consistently in close proximity. We bring one another down and I know we are both happier when we are not constantly around one another.

2. My relationship with my brother actually improves because when we don't live close by, we'll make the time to call one another to chat. Here, we live in the same home but NEVER talk.

3. I feel guilty that my parents aren't relaxing in their own home. Having "the kids" home means they still play the "Mom" and "Dad" role and we all revert to the dynamic of our growing up years.
When J and I lived in OK and my parents came to visit, they treated us like peers. Things have completely changed now that we're living together.

4. My mother is very clear that she doesn't give a damn whether anyone, ever, likes her or not. Her strong behavior and comments to me (and my brothers, and my father...) are one thing, but it puts me in a weird place when she gets on J about stuff. I want to defend him. It'll just be little things all the time... "Ahem...you're not planning on wearing a baseball cap at the table, are you?"  or when chickens somehow got into the yard here, "Is this redneck enough for you? Hahaha!"  (He's from the South.) It's not like she doesn't like him- she does. It's just this way that a lot of my family interacts, where basically everyone tears each other down with sarcasm and jokes.

5. I hate living in a place where I can't tell whether it's day or night because we have basically no sunlight.

This is our bedroom. Guess what time it is!

 

Answer: 3:30 in the afternoon.

6. I absolutely hate the winters here.

7. I immediately gain weight here. It's always the same amount and I'm not sure why it is. People assume it's just "home cooking", but my mother is not a big cook. In fact, pretty much everything is microwavable if she decides to make dinner at all. So no, the weight has nothing to do with consuming comfort food.

8. The bathroom floods.

Constantly.

As in, I'm in the shower washing my hair today and the drain stops working and water is collecting. I open the curtain to realize that the toilet has also overflowed, and the feeling of being clean is officially over before I even step out.

 

 

 ugh.