I think that it’s a big thing that I can say that Jessie and I never fight about money.  When things are tight and we are stressed about how we are going to make our money stretch, we are able to sit and talk it out without fighting about it.  This is a part of my marriage that makes me very proud.

Oh, it wasn’t always like that.  We had to do a trial by fire to learn how to calm the hell down where money was concerned.  We learned young, and we learned hard.

I was 19 when we moved in together.  We moved into a small trailer in our college town.  It was our first love nest.  Things were cheap, which was good since we were both still in school.  We both worked as work studies and made next to nothing.  We lived lean, but that was okay with us.

We had two credit cards, one in his name and one in my name.  Both had insanely small limits so we were never in any horrible danger of getting in over our heads.  The credit cards were used mainly as a way to break the monotony of being broke by splurging on dinner and a movie every now and then.

Then about a year later my mom moved to PA to live with her boyfriend.  We took over her house and her mortgage payments.  The mortgage payments were actually a little bit cheaper than the monthly lot rental we paid on the trailer.  We thought we’d found a sweet deal.  But then we discovered termites.  And a completely rotten roof.  And a completely rotten exterior wall.  And a rotten floor.  And sub-par electrical wiring.  And burst water pipes.

By this time, Jessie had gotten his degree and was working for an upstart company (it’s only employee) and was making $20k a year.  With my still being in school and doing my work study program, we weren’t bringing in much more than $23k a year together.

I can blame the hardships on that house falling to shit.  In all honesty it was part of the problem.  But we had a lot of help, too.  I can blame the credit card debt on the fact that we were promised a lot more help with the paying of our wedding than we actually received.  A lot of shitty circumstances came our way all at once and we were bulldozed into a corner.

The simple truth is that we were young, inexperienced, and not as careful as we could have been.  I dropped out of school and got a job.  Jessie got a raise to $30k a year.  That helped a little, but we ended up in that vicious cycle of paying the minimum payment on our credit cards (one of which had a limit on it far too high for us to keep up with) and then not having enough money to pay bills and buy food, so we’d have to use the credit cards to take care of that stuff.  We fought a lot about money in those days.

Then the offer was made to move to Seattle.  The small company was wanting to expand and WV simply wasn’t the place in which to do that.  We seized an opportunity to leave WV (something so few residents of that state actually do) and left for the West coast.

WV is a poverty state.  When we left, the number one employer in our area was Walmart.  Food is cheaper there.  Utilities are cheaper.  Living was cheaper.  We suffered from a massive and constant case of sticker shock for about 6 months when we first got to Washington.  And yet another set of unfortunate circumstances gripped us.  We were 3,000 miles from anyone and anything we ever knew.  We were without a car, and although the one person we knew in the area had previously offered to be of help in the transportation department, we soon learned he was a bit of an unreliable flake.  Jessie had to get to work, so we had to buy a car.  Not knowing that you could get financing on used cars (again, we were young) we bought a new car.  We were able to get a good price on it, but it was still a NEW CAR.

Jessie was given a raise upon moving to Washington to $40k, but once we got there and started paying rent on our scary little apartment in the middle of gang-murder-town and buying groceries, we learned that $40k was going to cause us to sink.

That feeling of knowing that things are spiraling out of control was unbearable for the both of us.  That constant panic that we could possibly be homeless so far away from family and friends scared us to death.  We never confided in anybody our situation because we were dead set on doing this thing on our own, but it was starting to get out of our hands.

Then we decided to file for bankruptcy.  This was back in 2006, before the economy went all the hell.  This was before bankruptcy laws were changed.  At first we contacted a lawyer.  He was over-zealous about getting ALL of our debt cleared.  We weren’t ok with that.  We wanted to continue making payments on our car and to pay off one small credit card on our own.  He argued with us.  We went the online route and paid a small fee to an agency that helped us with the paperwork, gave us online financial classes, and got us through that whole humiliating process rather quickly and painlessly.

That period of constant freaking out, living off of beans and hotdogs only, and eating a big fat piece of humble pie taught Jessie and I that of all the things in life to fight about, money was the most useless.  Not even with the insurance reaming we got when I had Lukas did we fight over money.  We learned that lesson.

We didn’t tell anyone about our filing for bankruptcy.  It’s something that we both feel we need to be ashamed of.  But seeing how the economy is now, and how hard it is hitting some people, I thought it might be helpful to one or two people to write about my story.  I asked Jessie if it was ok, and explained to him why I wanted to write about it (we still haven’t told many people about this) and he agreed it would be helpful.

I’m writing this to let you know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  There is a pasture on the other side of the fence with green grass and cool water.  With a little organization, penny pinching and some good decisions, I am in that green pasture.  Here I am, 4 years after the bankruptcy a homeowner.  We bought a house.  That’s huge.  We had a credit score good enough in this shitty economy to even get a terrific interest rate on our mortgage.  We still drive that car that we bought new in Washington.  It’s our only car and is 18 months away from being paid off.  We can take small vacations.  We can afford to go out to dinner every now and then.  We have two credit cards that are in no way choking us.  We can afford to spoil our kids.

It’s not the end of the world.  It’s hard and it’s painful to go through, but you’ve just got to pick yourself up by the bootstraps and charge forward.  It also taught Jessie and I to be self-reliant.  We know that we can live far away from family and live just fine with no help.  That sense of independence has been precious to both of us.  We know that we don’t NEED anything from anybody else.  We’ve got each other and that’s all we NEED.  It’s a weird thing to take away from such an experience, but it’s something we are both so glad to have.

I hope someone can find this and find some sunshine in it.  I hope someone who is starting to lose their grip on their finances sees this and says, “Well if she can get through it, so can I!”  And if I can be of any help in that department by imparting the wisdom that I gained from the experience, please feel free to email me (contact info is under the ABOUT tab at the top).  I’m more than happy to be of assistance.

The three of us actually had a fantastic long weekend.  Jessie is home again today and we are all having such a nice time together.  All of us are really relaxed and just really enjoying each other’s company.  It’s been great.

Friday, Jessie left work early and we went to my mom’s house.  My mom and step father are out of town but they gave us permission to use their pool and cabana while they were gone.  I spent that Friday cooking fried chicken for a picnic while some weird cable guy was in my house for almost 2 hours trying to ignore what I was telling him.  Want me to go into that story?  Too bad, I’m doing it anyhow.

Ever since our cable company has made the switch to where you need a digital cable box to get even basic channels and we got a second box just for that reason, we have been having horrid problems.  We subscribe to a bundle package where we have cable television, cable internet and the cable telephone.  Once we got the second box, things started fucking up.  On Demand wouldn’t work and the phone and internet kept going out.  I don’t like being without internet, but it really pissed me off that we were paying for phone service that was really unreliable.  They sent a workman out.  This guy was really super nice.  He kept me informed of what he was doing and when he found the problem he tried his best to explain it to me even though it was way over my head.  Basically maintenance had to come out to my house and replace wires and couplings at the pole.  That still didn’t fix the problem.  They sent another workman out.  This guy was also extremely nice and he listened to me when I explained what the last guy had done and I suggested that perhaps this second cable box was causing the problem since the problems started when we got it.  He agreed and said that he would replace the second box no problem.  He had to try two different boxes before one worked and he even explained to me why the equipment sometimes didn’t work.  He was awesome.  Well the new box fixed the On Demand problem but not the phone and internet problem.  *sigh*  They sent out another workman.  This guy was a doofus.  The best way I can describe it to you (especially my WV readers) is that he was a know-it-all redneck.  You know, the guy who thinks he knows how everything works and will not listen to reason.  Basically he came and stood in my living room (where there is NO cable equipment) and talked to himself for about five minutes….thoroughly creeping me out in the process.  Then he asked me what the problem was.  I explained to him that the phone and internet kept going out.  He then started going through the same long process that the first guy went through.  I stopped him and explained to him that he was the third workman who had come to our house about this problem and that he might want to look at the modem first.  Then I heard the signature know-it-all redneck line:  “I’m gonna tell you right now that your numbers are going to be out of whack!”

I tried not to laugh because he reminded me so much of a dumbass a friend of mine used to be married to.  So he looked at the numbers and then stood in my backyard talking to himself a while longer.  Then he came to me and asked me to show him where the cable modem was.  I showed it to him and you know what he ended up having to do?  Change out the modem.  Like I suggested he should try.  He was at my house for almost 2 hours.  But, the good news is that it seems to have fixed the problem.  I’m not really miffed at the cable company.  When we call, the people are always super nice and they always send a workman out the very next day.  And up until know-it-all showed up, the workman have all been awesome.  I hope the problem is fixed though.

ANYHOW, we spent the evening at my mom’s house swimming in the pool and just enjoying each other.  That night, we let off a few small fireworks to try to get Lukas excited for the 4th.  He wasn’t very interested.

Saturday, we went to a local lake to try fishing only to find that with all of the jet skis and motor boats (and lack of fishing areas) there was no chance we were going to get any fishing done there.  So, we shrugged it off and went back to mom’s house and spent that very hot day lounging in a pool.  It was a great day.

Sunday we were pooped and decided to stay home in the air conditioning.  That night, we grilled out and let off fireworks.  Again, Lukas could have cared less.  Jessie and I made clowns of ourselves playing with sparklers and doing stupid stuff trying to get his interest, and he ended up getting really annoyed with us.  Then we brought out the big noisy fireworks and he was still not having it.  Oh well, maybe next year.

Today we WERE going to stay home and just chill, but in the middle of writing this post, my mom called from her car on her way home from Philly and asked if we wanted to come over today.  I know part of the invitation is because it is hot as hell outside, but I know she really just wants to see Lukas.  It makes me a little misty-eyed to know that my mom will probably be to my kids what her mother was to my brother and I.  It makes me happy they will have that kind of connection with someone outside of their parents.

So I am finishing this blog right now with a very excited toddler pulling at my arm screaming “GRANDMA’S HOUSE” and “BIG WA WA” in my ear.  It’s cute and annoying all at once. I’ll end this with some awesome pictures from the weekend.  I have videos as well, but I’ll make a separate post for those.

I don’t know if it is a Lukas-thing or a little boy-thing, but this kid LOVES being naked, and I know my mom will get a good laugh out of seeing him running around bare-ass on her patio.  I also love my censor-the-winky job.

He was more interested in the mac n’ cheese than in the fireworks.

It was a good holiday.  Stresses were forgotten and I remembered to count myself as lucky to have two sweet faces smiling at me when I looked up.  Soon it will be three sweet faces.  Life is good.

This weekend, I received a message on Facebook that informed me that my 10 year high school reunion is in 1 year.  The message was asking for ideas on what should be done for the reunion since our class president has since passed away.  We were only a graduating class of less than 120 people, so having the opinions of the herd was thought to be helpful.

I’m not going.  I’M.  NOT.  GOING.  It’s not that I have a certain beef with anybody because I was picked on or that I am scared that everybody is going to see how fat I’ve gotten.  It’s not like that.  Yeah there were cliques, but since we were such a small class, we all bumped into each other from time to time and exchanged a friendly word or two before moving on.

But people, I hated high school!  I loved those years when I was in high school, but I didn’t actually like school.  I didn’t like that awkward girl that I was.  I didn’t like the hierarchy that the teachers helped to facilitate.  I didn’t like it.  When I graduated high school, I was SO HAPPY to be out of there.

Don’t get me wrong, I have some good memories of the actual school experience that had nothing to do with getting felt up in the equipment room in band class, or cutting out early to go to the mall, or all of the “extracurricular” activities in which I happily participated.  I have great memories of the Latin class that I took my Senior year.  I have great memories of my Honors English classes.  I have great memories of my Biology class Sophomore year.  But that’s behind me.

I don’t want to have to worry about losing a little bit of weight so that I can go to a cocktail party with a bunch of people I don’t know (and who don’t know me).  I don’t want to have to make small talk.  I don’t want to have to huddle in a corner with the select few people that I DO know and talk about how weird it is to see everybody again and how we all still pretty much look the same (Umm, it’s only been 10 years!).

I’ve already documented the horror story of being attacked for carrying a bag ONLY FOR CHEERLEADERS by a teacher.  Now, let me impress upon you another story that I occasionally look back on with great ire.

My Senior year, my homeroom teacher pulled me out into the hallway to have a talk with me.

“I want you to know why you weren’t chosen to be in the National Honor Society,” he told me.  “You meet all of the requirements, but the sentiment among some of the teachers is that you are too quiet.  People in the National Honor Society need to be outgoing and have moxie.  These teachers think you are too meek.”

“But I talk in your class all the time.  I talk in a lot of my classes.  I raise my hand, I answer questions.  My teachers all know me.  I don’t understand.”  I said.

He stared at his shoes.  “Maybe you’re not talking enough in the right classes.  Maybe you haven’t made a big enough impression on the right people.”

“Are you telling me that I didn’t get in because I’m not a suck up?”  I asked.

He continued to stare at his shoes.  “That’s not the term that I would use.  But essentially, yes.”

My teacher, who was a good guy despite making me sit in the back of class for falling asleep (I had finished my test early [and aced it!] and he didn’t allow us to read or do anything else to entertain ourselves, so after sitting there for 20 minutes staring at my desk, I dozed) didn’t give any names, but I know that the teacher on whom I didn’t make the best impression was the one teacher in that high school who most valued having her ass kissed.  One of my other friends didn’t suck up to her either, but she regularly had strong bonds with other teachers (she also totally deserved her admission into the society).  Why the fuck was I picked on?  I wasn’t a super student (long story, not just laziness) but I think that I deserved in there.  So again, I was struck in the face with the cheap hierarchy that this small school took complete advantage of and once again I got the short end of the stick.

I’m a grown up.  I’m much more secure in my self identity.  I’m much more capable of telling snobby people to go sit and spin.  However, I still look back on some of those occasions, occasions where I was PICKED ON BY ADULTS and it makes me sick.  I realize that these people won’t be at the reunion and that if I’m not at the reunion nothing interesting could possibly happen, but I just don’t want to relive some of those moments.  I want to keep those hurts in my past.  High school is behind me.  And besides, the people from my school who meant anything to me are still a big part of my life.  If they want to get together, let’s rent a dance hall, see if we can find the Dugger (DUGGER DANCES) and spike the punch!  Then we can go sit outside, smoke lights, and listen to terrible music.  If I want to revisit those years, those are the memories that I would like to touch again.

(And now the screaming rants from Aschlie will start…..)  (She BETTER not boycott me over THIS) (Or I WILL post pictures of her in a string bikini)