LJI: Jetsam
I wish my jetsam would, y'know...JET.
But it keeps fucking hanging around, making waves, reminding me in a not-so-subtle tone "Bitch, you still need to deal with us." And then sticks out its tongue and goes "nyah nyah nyah."
Whatever, whatever, yada yada.
Mostly my jetsam costs me money. I may have dealt with the baggage itself, but the drain on my pocket reminds me (frequently) that it's not gone yet.
Let's start with the house. Although I now live in Texas, I'm still floating a mortgage back in North Carolina. Let me tell you how much fun it is to float a mortgage and rent (and all the other associated monetary goodies that come with the non-virtual version of Life) on a grad student's "salary."
I may finally have an opportunity to cut the strings there, though - there is (finally) a contract pending on the house. I'll probably still end up having to pay nearly a thousand dollars at closing just to get rid of the thing, but at least then I can wipe my hands of it.
Then there's my former job (well, a few jobs ago). Y'see, I started working as the clinical coordinator at an agency back in 2008. They *might* have neglected to mention that at the time they owed Medicaid nearly a hundred thousand dollars and thus didn't have the money to do little things like, y'know, pay the staff? Even after they copped to the money issues, my dumb ass (and several others) fought the good fight and tried to turn the agency around for several months. But you can't get blood from a stone, and so we eventually quit and the agency went under. Never did get paid, to the tune of nearly 10k.
I could really use that 10k. But since the owner of the agency filed bankruptcy, the odds I'll ever see a dime are slim to none (and naturally, Slim's out of town). But I keep the "amount owed" in my Excel tracking just in case, and it burns me every time I look at it.
There are little snippets, too. Little "owed to me" in my spreadsheet that I'll likely never see. Friends who I loaned money to when they were going through rough patches.
I know, I know, you should always consider money given to friends as gifts rather than loans. But they said they would pay it back and never have, and so the column in my spreadsheet mocks me.
And then finally there's the motherload. The big ole crowning glory. My ex-husband. Not that he was a bad man or anything, but that's 160 pounds of dead weight that definitely needed to get tossed overboard.
The divorce was fairly amicable, and there was an (unofficial, of course) understanding that he owed me just shy of 20k as his share of the credit card debt we had accumulated while together.
Because he was lazy (and a dumbass), he never bothered taking me off the car insurance, so we mutually agreed that that "counted" as him paying $100 a month off of what he owed me (generous on my part, I feel, given that now that I finally pay for my own insurance it costs my girlfriend and I $100 a month combined to insure both our vehicles. But I digress.). That finally stopped in August 2010. Our agreement post-divorce started in June 2006. I'll let you do the math.
So I have been poking at him for quite awhile to begin some form of payment plan - say maybe $300 to $500 a month. Has he done anything about it? No, of course not.
I've been a patient gal, really I have. But I feel my claws below the surface, and they're itching to come out.
See, I feel for him - he and his new wife have two special needs children that have a ton of medical bills.
But I have bills, too, dammit.
And I also have years worth of email in which he confirms exactly how much money he owes me.
So my inner bitch is about to go on the warpath. Had a darling accountant friend crunch the math for me - how much would he owe me given the fact that I have still been paying interest on the credit cards and considering the "payments" he has made to me? If you're math-inclined, you're welcome to figure it out, but let's just say that it's *considerably* more than the principal balance he would owe if he would just start making payments. Like nearly double. So his choices will be to either start repayment on the principal or I will go after him in court for the full amount, with interest and court costs.
Pretty soon I'm going to have to send a nasty-gram via email to him. I really don't want to threaten him. Really. But this has got to stop, and I need my money.
I don't expect he'll respond well, and part of why I'm waiting is to make sure I have the energy to deal with whatever nastiness he throws back at me.
But I will get around to sending that email, and soon. I need to be able to cut loose that rope once and for all and say "so long, farewell" to the jetsam that just won't float away.
This has been an entry for LJ Idol. If you want to vote (and assuming it's a public vote), the link will be up later today or tomorrow.
But it keeps fucking hanging around, making waves, reminding me in a not-so-subtle tone "Bitch, you still need to deal with us." And then sticks out its tongue and goes "nyah nyah nyah."
Whatever, whatever, yada yada.
Mostly my jetsam costs me money. I may have dealt with the baggage itself, but the drain on my pocket reminds me (frequently) that it's not gone yet.
Let's start with the house. Although I now live in Texas, I'm still floating a mortgage back in North Carolina. Let me tell you how much fun it is to float a mortgage and rent (and all the other associated monetary goodies that come with the non-virtual version of Life) on a grad student's "salary."
I may finally have an opportunity to cut the strings there, though - there is (finally) a contract pending on the house. I'll probably still end up having to pay nearly a thousand dollars at closing just to get rid of the thing, but at least then I can wipe my hands of it.
Then there's my former job (well, a few jobs ago). Y'see, I started working as the clinical coordinator at an agency back in 2008. They *might* have neglected to mention that at the time they owed Medicaid nearly a hundred thousand dollars and thus didn't have the money to do little things like, y'know, pay the staff? Even after they copped to the money issues, my dumb ass (and several others) fought the good fight and tried to turn the agency around for several months. But you can't get blood from a stone, and so we eventually quit and the agency went under. Never did get paid, to the tune of nearly 10k.
I could really use that 10k. But since the owner of the agency filed bankruptcy, the odds I'll ever see a dime are slim to none (and naturally, Slim's out of town). But I keep the "amount owed" in my Excel tracking just in case, and it burns me every time I look at it.
There are little snippets, too. Little "owed to me" in my spreadsheet that I'll likely never see. Friends who I loaned money to when they were going through rough patches.
I know, I know, you should always consider money given to friends as gifts rather than loans. But they said they would pay it back and never have, and so the column in my spreadsheet mocks me.
And then finally there's the motherload. The big ole crowning glory. My ex-husband. Not that he was a bad man or anything, but that's 160 pounds of dead weight that definitely needed to get tossed overboard.
The divorce was fairly amicable, and there was an (unofficial, of course) understanding that he owed me just shy of 20k as his share of the credit card debt we had accumulated while together.
Because he was lazy (and a dumbass), he never bothered taking me off the car insurance, so we mutually agreed that that "counted" as him paying $100 a month off of what he owed me (generous on my part, I feel, given that now that I finally pay for my own insurance it costs my girlfriend and I $100 a month combined to insure both our vehicles. But I digress.). That finally stopped in August 2010. Our agreement post-divorce started in June 2006. I'll let you do the math.
So I have been poking at him for quite awhile to begin some form of payment plan - say maybe $300 to $500 a month. Has he done anything about it? No, of course not.
I've been a patient gal, really I have. But I feel my claws below the surface, and they're itching to come out.
See, I feel for him - he and his new wife have two special needs children that have a ton of medical bills.
But I have bills, too, dammit.
And I also have years worth of email in which he confirms exactly how much money he owes me.
So my inner bitch is about to go on the warpath. Had a darling accountant friend crunch the math for me - how much would he owe me given the fact that I have still been paying interest on the credit cards and considering the "payments" he has made to me? If you're math-inclined, you're welcome to figure it out, but let's just say that it's *considerably* more than the principal balance he would owe if he would just start making payments. Like nearly double. So his choices will be to either start repayment on the principal or I will go after him in court for the full amount, with interest and court costs.
Pretty soon I'm going to have to send a nasty-gram via email to him. I really don't want to threaten him. Really. But this has got to stop, and I need my money.
I don't expect he'll respond well, and part of why I'm waiting is to make sure I have the energy to deal with whatever nastiness he throws back at me.
But I will get around to sending that email, and soon. I need to be able to cut loose that rope once and for all and say "so long, farewell" to the jetsam that just won't float away.
This has been an entry for LJ Idol. If you want to vote (and assuming it's a public vote), the link will be up later today or tomorrow.