While some might say financial independence is the last hurdle to adulthood, I would rather trade in my pass to the real world for a trip on the free-ride train.
Why take such drastic measures? The problem is, learn-how-to-be-a-member-of-society mistakes are getting pricey these days. The learning curve is simply too steep.
Having a job (or a steady cash flow from financial aid) affords you privileges all around. You can travel and not have to call your parents when you get there. You can stay up late and not apologize to anyone when you wake up at 2:30 p.m. You can spend your money on a neon bar sign for your apartment and feel like it was a good investment. But the dark side to all that freedom is the consequences. Stay up till the sun rises and walk around like the living dead the next morning for class. When that road trip goes awry in a desolate stretch of road, you get to pay the towing company. Bounce a check and see what little money you had left melt away.
Mistakes like these are supposedly our informal education about life. Trial by fire, if you will. The thing is, when you live at home, these lessons mostly are free. If we accidentally bleached a pair of jeans, a new pair might appear (after a reprimand of course). If we broke an arm, our parent's insurance paid the way to a cast. Other people's money is the easiest kind to spend.
But when you live at school, these so-called learning experiences get outright expensive, and the outlays of cash hurt more every time you realize your naïveté.
For example, not checking with my credit card company before I transferred balances incurred me a $50 fee. Not keeping a perfect record of my bills got me $40 in the hole to the city, a fee I had to pay so our landlord would free our security deposits. Choosing the wrong hair color could be a hundred dollar foray. And don't get me started on bad clothing investments, such as the bad one I once made on a fringed jacket.
The pain doesn't stop there. I feel shocked every time I go to the store to buy a necessity. At first, for example, I saw buying my own toilet paper as a symbol of being able to take care of myself. It was certainly not
something I ever had to buy for myself at home. Now my roommates can attest to the fact that I avoid paper-buying responsibilities like I avoid getting up for 8 a.m. classes.
Even not taking care of yourself can cost you. Six dollars for over the counter cold medicine is enough to make me want to drink my orange juice and be in bed by 11.
If this is the stuff of life
can I get someone else to take care of it?
Eventually, I have found my way through the jungle of financial sinkholes. I know now the only Parmesan cheese worth buying is Kraft (anything else is a mistake) and cell phone minute usage deserves my close attention. Fee warnings from the bank and the credit card company are always worth heeding.
Even still, my fear is that my mistakes will only get more expensive as my financial independence becomes more authentic. My solution? I've decided that a benefactor is in order. Being a beneficiary is the perfect backup career. It doesn't require many qualifications and the only income you have is the dispensable kind. Best of all, you would be free to allocate your time at will and you'd always have someone to pay off a bad investment. Too bad there aren't a lot of openings. 17
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Jessica Moskwa
