insert tiresome heat joke here
Today I did something I hadn't done in months: bought a loaf of bread. Yeah, well I've really been enjoying making my own, but when it's 95 degrees outside, turning on the oven doesn't seem all that attractive. alas.
I am experiencing conflicted feelings about my financial situation. As you may have noticed in my Twitter posts of last week, I paid off my last student loan. That was kind of anticlimactic. I noticed one day that the total amount left on the loan was about a dollar more than my monthly payment, so I just paid it. It feels good in the sense of, you know, here I am twelve years out of college and finally done paying for it. And I know it'll be one less bill to pay every month now. But it still feels kind of hollow.
Annoyingly, the day after I made that last payment, I got a letter telling me that the interest rate on that loan was decreasing dramatically -- from something like 7.5% to 4%. Too little too late!
I've also been borrowing more from my mom of late. Fortunately, she just refinanced her home equity loan into a REALLY low rate, so my monthly payments to her will go down, but still, it makes me uncomfortable to be so far in hock. At least it's my mom and not a bank, of course.
The other thing is that several things are converging to (one hopes) make things easier on me in the near future.
* I got a bit of a raise.
* Isaac will be starting kindergarten whereupon his childcare costs will decrease about $400/month.
* no more student loan.
And the other day one of Ruthie's daycare teachers made a comment to me about Ruthie moving up to the next room and I said well that's not till December because she has to be 2.9 (two years nine months), and she said no, they move them up at 2.6 (two years six months). Which was news to me, but I haven't had a chance yet to follow up with the admins. In any case, either in Sept or Dec, Ruthie will be moving up and her costs will decrease by about $120/month.
But then there's the water bill that I got, in the amount of $1100. Did I post about that here? I am dreading calling the city to ask about it. I really fear that it'll turn out that we have a leak somewhere in the house, so not only will we have to pay the $1100, but we'll have to pay huge sums to a plumber to find and fix the leak. I wish I could believe it'll turn out to be an error in the water meter and the whole thing will go away, but well, I don't.
And then there's the weird thing that the brakes in my car are doing....
So, the bottom line is that I have several good reasons to feel hopeful that things will start getting better soon...and yet, I don't feel hopeful. It just seems impossible to imagine ever digging myself out of all this debt. Maybe that's just my desire for instant gratification talking.
Somehow it will all work itself out, I guess. It's just discouraging to see how fast the money disappears. Each payday comes and I'm already planning out how I'll allocate everything to make it through to the next. And I can't get over feeling how wrong it is that things are this way given the salary I make! But don't get me started on How Our Society Conspires To Keep The Single Mom Down. We'll be here all night. ;P
Hey, sorry to make my first substantive post in ages such a downer of a one. Uh, have I mentioned lately that my kids are adorable? ...yeah, I got nothin'. Try again tomorrow.
I am experiencing conflicted feelings about my financial situation. As you may have noticed in my Twitter posts of last week, I paid off my last student loan. That was kind of anticlimactic. I noticed one day that the total amount left on the loan was about a dollar more than my monthly payment, so I just paid it. It feels good in the sense of, you know, here I am twelve years out of college and finally done paying for it. And I know it'll be one less bill to pay every month now. But it still feels kind of hollow.
Annoyingly, the day after I made that last payment, I got a letter telling me that the interest rate on that loan was decreasing dramatically -- from something like 7.5% to 4%. Too little too late!
I've also been borrowing more from my mom of late. Fortunately, she just refinanced her home equity loan into a REALLY low rate, so my monthly payments to her will go down, but still, it makes me uncomfortable to be so far in hock. At least it's my mom and not a bank, of course.
The other thing is that several things are converging to (one hopes) make things easier on me in the near future.
* I got a bit of a raise.
* Isaac will be starting kindergarten whereupon his childcare costs will decrease about $400/month.
* no more student loan.
And the other day one of Ruthie's daycare teachers made a comment to me about Ruthie moving up to the next room and I said well that's not till December because she has to be 2.9 (two years nine months), and she said no, they move them up at 2.6 (two years six months). Which was news to me, but I haven't had a chance yet to follow up with the admins. In any case, either in Sept or Dec, Ruthie will be moving up and her costs will decrease by about $120/month.
But then there's the water bill that I got, in the amount of $1100. Did I post about that here? I am dreading calling the city to ask about it. I really fear that it'll turn out that we have a leak somewhere in the house, so not only will we have to pay the $1100, but we'll have to pay huge sums to a plumber to find and fix the leak. I wish I could believe it'll turn out to be an error in the water meter and the whole thing will go away, but well, I don't.
And then there's the weird thing that the brakes in my car are doing....
So, the bottom line is that I have several good reasons to feel hopeful that things will start getting better soon...and yet, I don't feel hopeful. It just seems impossible to imagine ever digging myself out of all this debt. Maybe that's just my desire for instant gratification talking.
Somehow it will all work itself out, I guess. It's just discouraging to see how fast the money disappears. Each payday comes and I'm already planning out how I'll allocate everything to make it through to the next. And I can't get over feeling how wrong it is that things are this way given the salary I make! But don't get me started on How Our Society Conspires To Keep The Single Mom Down. We'll be here all night. ;P
Hey, sorry to make my first substantive post in ages such a downer of a one. Uh, have I mentioned lately that my kids are adorable? ...yeah, I got nothin'. Try again tomorrow.