Donating to Your Alma Mater

Maybe you are familiar with the calls. They start out with a simple friendly hello, then the person asks to update your contact information, starts talking to you, asks how your life is going, then boom, the reason they really called comes out. They want your money. Its your alma mater, asking for donations. Maybe this time you’ll get a cool pair of socks along with your donation or a year subscription to your alma mater’s magazine so you can stay in touch with all the happenings of the school. They try to ensnare you, make you feel nostalgic, and not focus on the money until they need to. Even if you don’t answer the calls, the pleas come in other forms. They mail things to your house, intermingled with the bills and the credit card offers. There’s no escape.

The phone rings. It is another one of the dreaded calls from my college Alma Mater. Asking for donations. Again. I understand the value of education and I believe that overall, I’m better off with my education than I would be without it. I also understand that not everyone can afford college and that many need help with it. But in modern times I do not believe that the values that colleges are supposed to have are being honored. College costs have risen faster than any other sector and a lot of this is due to unnecessary spending and administrative bloat.

A lot of this is because colleges can. The demand has risen for college along with the cost. More and more students are told that they could go to college. That they should go to college. That they deserved to go to college. Many students were told that basically if they didn’t go to college they were throwing their lives away and they would amount to nothing. Then there was the access to student loans. It was easy money that students could get while they were young. Yes, college had a cost, but the bill didn’t come until later, so students adopted a go to college now and pay later attitude. This funneled more money into universities that started the college spending bubble. And this spending isn’t all going into helping students.

Let me share some of my college experiences. I attended a large public state research university. While I was there both the student fees and the price of tuition both DOUBLED. Here are some of the various happenings that have made me lose all faith that they are good stewards of anybody’s money. The gym on campus was renovated 5 times. Like major renovations every single time. There was barely a moment when the gym was not under renovations. And it was a pretty nice gym to begin with. It was housed in a giant building with many twisted hallways that made me feel like I was entering the bowels of some labyrinth when I went to the bottom floor. There were weight rooms, work out rooms, an indoor track, a 2 story rock wall, racquetball rooms, 2 indoor swimming pools, a basketball court, and more! This was before the renovations. Every time there was renovations we were left with pretty much the exact same facilities, but newer looking and shinier. These renovations were not necessary.

And the gym was not the end of it! Here are other happenings that went on:

  • The library cafeteria atrium was renovated twice
  • The bookstore had 3 separate locations on campus complete with new buildings each time.
  • The student center was completely rebuilt during my time there despite students voting against the new student center because they didn’t want student fees to increase. (I didn’t have a student center until my last semester there because of this.)
  • A brand new library was built on one of the campuses, so each main campus had a library but then they wouldn’t keep the library open past 8pm for “budgetary concerns”
  • A new cafeteria and new dorms were also constructed
  • The old chancellors mansion was renovated to become an art museum
  • A brand new 8,500-square-foot mansion for the chancellor was constructed complete with a stunning view of a lake and walls and gates around the entire property.

Also, while I was there the chancellor and board of directors repeatably gave themselves raises while the student fees and tuition steadily climbed. Meanwhile, they blamed the cuts in state funding for the those rising tuition costs.

I hope that from the list above that what was apparent to me as a student will become apparent to you also. That my school doesn’t need money, it needs a financial makeover. During my time at the school I was never made to feel like anything other than a number. My classes were huge, my professors largely uncaring. I graduated with almost $40,000 dollars in debt despite working while I went to school. So when they call and ask for money, I say “I have paid you. I am still paying you. I pay you every month. Do not ask me for money.”

 

University fancy building

All Roads Lead to Rome (Unpopular Opinion: Rome is Overrated)

Last year, we went to Italy for a 10 day vacation, the last 5 days of which were spent in Rome. And we need to talk about Rome. I wanted to write a wonderful piece on how to save money in town, and all the things to do in Rome, a review of the Roma pass and more. But I find that I can’t write that post because there is something that is in the way and its because I didn’t like Rome.
This has to be an unpopular opinion and I certainly didn’t expect to have this opinion. I expected to fall in love with Rome. But the truth is that from the first moment we arrived in Rome I wished we had never left Tuscany. I suffered through the 5 days we spent there, trying to make the best of it. But I didn’t like it. I want to try to explain why.

People
So many people

What its really like to visit the Vatican

I purposefully picked October because I had heard that going in the summer or near a holiday would cause Rome to be so crowded that you could not enjoy it. October was perfect for the weather, the crowds not so much. I cannot imagine what the crowds are like in the summer or around holidays because everything was so crowded that I felt like I was in a herd of cattle wherever I went. The online boards I read told me to not go on a Wednesday or the weekend, so I went on a Tuesday. They also said to go to the vatican in the afternoon since there are more tour groups in the morning and its supposed to be less crowded. Less crowded by what standards I ask? I have never seen so many people in my life.

Very crowded hallway
This many people in this small space cannot be safe

My advice is just don’t go to the Vatican. I don’t see how you can enjoy anything. People ask me about the Sistine Chapel since now I’ve seen it. My advice? Don’t go see it. Its not worth it. The Vatican museum was so full of people that you cannot even walk around full stride without people being EVERYWHERE! And then the Sistine Chapel itself was the worst of it. The entire place was packed to the brim with people standing shoulder to shoulder. There are benches along the walls but since there are so many people you have such a slim chance of getting one of those. Have these people ever heard of fire codes? It cannot be safe to have that many people stuffed into a room. Now the art itself is pretty nice but you soon develop a horrible crank in your neck from trying to stare straight up at the ceiling while passerby step on your toes. You might come prepared with your earbuds to have an audio guide explain the room to you so you know what you are looking at, but good luck hearing it. With that many people in a room the constant murmuring and loud talking of all the Asians who can’t read the English signs telling you “No talking! Quiet! Silence!”, broken up occasionally by the loud yelling of the Vatican officials yelling “Silence!”, good luck hearing that audio guide. To be frank it just wasn’t worth it. Italy is filled with elaborately painted ceilings, the Sistine Chapel just isn’t that different.

The line to St. Peter's Basilica, taken from where we were in line, which was not the back
The line to St. Peter’s Basilica, taken from where we were in line, which was not the back

Moving onto St. Peter’s Basilica itself…. I personally say that I completely agree with Michelangelo on this one. They shouldn’t have put that baroque facade on the front of St. Peters. It makes the dome less impressive. Even though St. Peter’s is larger than the dome in Florence it doesn’t look as impressive since its in the distance being dwarfed by that baroque facade. To actually get into St. Peters you have to wait in a really long line. It wasn’t that bad the day we went and the line was only an hour. Even more annoying than standing in line was the annoying street salesmen who constantly came up to you trying to talk you into buying their overpriced tours! We had to keep asking them to leave us alone! Then there is the actual basilica itself, it is very very big inside. And very beautiful. I can see why people might have a religious experience being in there. But I myself could not have a religious experience. I was too distracted by the hoards of people all over the cathedral to really take in the sanctity of the place. It was beautiful and big but I have to say that there were other cathedrals in Rome that I found just as beautiful that I actually enjoyed way more because I was able to relax and take them in without crowds of people.

Inside St. Peter's
Inside St. Peter’s…the crowds just won’t stop

There was not actually that much history to be found in Rome

I find the history of Rome to be completely fascinating and I was looking forward to seeing it all where it happened. The political struggles of the ancient Roman empire and the rule of the Vatican are some of the most engaging periods in history and I thought I would learn tons about the ancient world and the church. What greeted me was a sprawling dirty city with periodic ancient ruins. Even though I could go see the ruins and sites that were thousands of years old there was very little information that was given. Even on the tours I went on, I was left learning very little and not understanding the political and social factors around what happened. Everything was presented in a shallow, lighthearted way. An example of this was the Colosseum. I found the way it was presented slightly offensive. It was shown as one huge fun thing and oh! look Gladiators. I personally do not find gladiators to be amusing. I find the amount of death that happened there for amusement to be disturbing and not a lighthearted matter at all.

Palatine Hill
Palatine Hill

The city is difficult to navigate

We had maps and we wanted to take public transportation around the city but I found that the metro doesn’t actually go very near a lot of the things that you actually want to see. The metro entrances were sometimes far away and the signs for how to get to the metro were not clear. Granted, some of that may be soon be fixed by them building a third metro line. I also found the city itself often confusing to navigate by walking. One afternoon we spent almost an hour trying to figure out how to enter a garden that just had a huge wall between it and the rest of the city with no identifiable entrances. Anyway I haven’t had the same experience in other cities.

Caterpillar
This caterpillar seems happy enough on Palatine Hill

Other general grievances

The bathroom situation there need some serious explaining. About 80% of the toilets I encountered in public had some sort of toilet seat issue going on. Either the toilet seat was broken, removed, or just completely missing. This seemed to happen almost everywhere I went. It seemed to occur in both male and female bathrooms and in free public WCs and in fancy restaurants. Everywhere I went I encountered this strange phenomenon of missing and broken toilet seats. And the fact that there was a small minority of toilets with toilet seats still intact assured me that it wasn’t that toilet seats just aren’t a thing there, so I’m perplexed.

Trevi Fountain cleaning
If you get to the Trevi Fountain really early you’ll beat the crowds, but also the fountain won’t be on and the cleaning guys won’t let you near it

But the most annoying part of Rome were the street vendors. Especially the ones around the Colosseum and the Vatican. They were beyond pushy or persistent in trying to sell their crap. At first we were polite with a simple “no, thank you” and trying to walk away from them but over time I became more aggravated by them. Many of these vendors try to act like they are “officials” wearing vests and attempting to order people around. We even had some yelling at us that “We were going the wrong way”, as he tried to bar our way from walking down the sidewalk. I lost my patience and compassion with him since he had no way to know if we were “going the wrong way” since he didn’t know where we were going! These street vendors we encountered that behaved this way were not Italian and they did not speak Italian, they only yelled at us English. I just pretended to not understand them and tried to ignore them. Others on forums suggest to just ignore them, not make eye contact, etc. but those tactics just didn’t work on these people. They would literally run after you in the street! It made it difficult to enjoy being out and about.

Finally, a little bit of positivity

Overall, I am glad that I have been to Rome, but I wish that I had spent less time there. It just wasn’t my kind of city. Rome can be overrated if you go where the crowds go and try to tick off some prescribed list on what you have to see. My most interesting and fun times in Rome were when we just wandered around. My advice is to stay somewhere close to the sights, only go see what is important to you and skip the “Must-sees” and also don’t expect too much. After all, it is just a city. And to end this article here is a list of stuff in Rome I did enjoy!

  • Tiramisu
  • Castel Sant’Angelo
  • Pantheon
  • Appian way
  • The Roman Forum
  • Paprika Chips
  • Olive Trees
  • Beautiful Cathedrals on almost corner
  • The sunsets
bird on a column
Maybe Rome isn’t all bad…

In Defense of Poland

When I first decided to study abroad in college I thought that I would go somewhere like the UK or Australia. Somewhere that everyone knew about and would be impressed by. And then I saw the price tag. In fact, I’m ashamed to say it, but the thing that first drew Poland to my attention was the much lower price of studying abroad there. It was so low that it was cheaper than staying a semester at home in the U.S. There were a few other places that were also pretty low cost as well but after some research, I decided that there was no where I wanted to go and live for a few months more than Poland.

I was drawn to the stories and history. I was fascinated by how the architecture was a mix of eastern and western designs. But the more I found out, the more I was drawn too an element that I hadn’t initially thought of – their people. I became intrigued by how a people that had suffered so much had remained so resilient. Through the wars and the communist era, their people had come through it. I wanted to meet these people.

One of many fine cathedrals in Polska
One of many fine cathedrals in Polska

So off to Poland I went. And I was not disappointed. The people were all I could have imagined and more. In Poland I met the nicest, kindest, bravest people I had ever met. They were friendly people who would greet you warmly even when they barely knew you. Being a young woman who had been raised in a rural community in the Southern United States, I felt right at home with the tidings of “Cześć” and the warm smiles. Everywhere I went I could find someone who wanted to talk to me. One night we stayed much too late at a restaurant in Poznan so that the public transportation had shut down. We were at the table trying to figure out how to get home when the waitress offered to walk us across town to our dorms to make sure we got home safe! Talk about generosity! This was the common theme among the people I met in Poland. They really are the nicest people.

This is one of the reasons that I have become sort of distraught with the public opinion I have heard about Poland in the past year. I have started to see a lot of media portraying Poland and the Polish people in a negative light. This criticism has mostly been around the strong sense of national Polish pride and Poland’s unwillingness to accept some of the mandates from the EU around accepting refugees. I have heard people describe the Polish people as racist, bigoted, and fascist. I’m not even Polish and I find these statements offensive! These reports are so different than the kindhearted, resilient people that I met and lived amongst.

Castle in Poznan
cool castles

I wanted to share my own opinion of these reports because I don’t believe they are warranted. Polish people have a sense of pride for their country. I could see this very easily after I arrived. They are a united people who want to preserve their culture. I admire their spirit in this. They have a rich history going back 1000 years that is often overlooked by the more “mainstream” western countries. You rarely hear about the Polish soldiers that helped the Americans win their independence from Britain in the 1700s. You also don’t hear about how bravely the Polish fought during the crusades with their winged hussar units. They are swept under the rug. They have gone through so much in the past 100 years. In the past 100 years, they suffered as one of the main battle fronts for 2 world wars, and then went through 40 years of communist rule. Since regaining their freedom, the Polish people are eager to show their national pride. They are proud that they have regained what they had previously lost. And I commend them for it. I understand their conservative nature to change, their fear of outside forces. Given their history, it makes complete sense.

So with that in mind, please don’t take the reports of Poland you may hear in the news without a grain of salt. Poland and its people represent a type of diversity that is unusual on a global scale. A country with unity, that refuses to apologize for its existence. That holds onto its history and tradition instead of casting it away like trash. They should be allowed to exist in peace, without unfounded labels that exaggerate and serve to paint them as villains. They should be allowed to be proud of who they are without fear of persecution. I can truly say that when I chose to visit Poland I unwittingly chose a real gem. One that I become more and more proud of every day.

View of Krakow
View of Krakow

A Week in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico is a beautiful island in the Caribbean. One of the best things about Puerto Rico is that since it is a U.S. territory, American citizens can travel there without having to get a passport. This was one of the reasons that we decided to visit last year. We spent 7 days on the beautiful island of Puerto Rico. I decided to focus the trip on San Juan mostly. When I travel I like to have a more authentic experience and get a good idea of where I am visiting but we also wanted a little bit of a romantic getaway so we wanted to spoil ourselves just a little while still saving money. Here is our itinerary that allowed us see the best of Puerto Rico in just 7 days.

Day 1:

Arrive in San Juan Puerto Rico. To save money we took the bus from the airport to the old town San Juan. It was only 75¢ each!!!

Villa Herencia
Villa Herencia

The bus dropped us off near the port where the cruise ships dock and we had to walk the rest of the way to get to our hotel in the old town.
Warning: It is hot and old San Juan is sorta hilly, and the streets are narrow and cobblestone. Be conscious of this if you go. We stayed at this little boutique hotel in old San Juan for the first half of our trip called the Villa Herencia. Villa Herencia is located right near the old gate to the city and is also right near the cathedral. It was a good and mostly quiet part of the city.

After getting settled in we went and had a dinner of strawberry daiquiris made from fresh fruit and my first taste mofongo! Mofongo is a type of plantain dish that is served in Puerto Rico. Puerto Ricans are all about some plantains. Then it was a walk around the city where we felt the sea breeze and we took a walk along the Paseo de la Princesa. The Paseo de la Princesa is a beautiful walk outside of the old city walls.

Day 2:

We woke up bright and early ready to see more of old San Juan. We were feeling so bright eyed and bushy tailed that we decided to take the scenic route to the Castle. We walked along the water on a walkway to the Castillo San Felipe del Morro. This is a long walk when its hot. Bring some water. The walk is a beautiful view of the ocean and it is nice to watch the ships come in.

Path to the Castle

We got to the Castillo San Felipe on the top of the hill where we bought tickets for the castle. The castle is pretty awesome and dates back several hundred years. If you’re a sucker for old stuff and history like me then you’ll love it. I recommend you go early in the day. It is very hot in the middle of the day and there is no air conditioning. I think everyone except me likes to sleep in on vacation because there was hardly anybody there until 10am. But at 10am the sun got hotter and the tourists started pouring in and it got crowded. We left soon thereafter to go take a break out of the sun and grab lunch at a local spot where we had some more plantains but this time it was plantain chips.

After lunch we headed to the Castillo San Cristóbal which you get into for no additional cost if you go on the same day as the Castillo San Felipe del Morro. We just presented our entry ticket and they let us right on in. This castle is a little more modern and you can see where the U.S. government used this as a lookout in WWII. There is also a small museum that has air conditioning. One of the cool things that were on the grounds were the iguanas. There were just iguanas chilling on the grass when we went.

Day 3:

On Day 3 we woke up to rain clouds. Between rain storms we went to the Santa María Magdalena de Pazzis Cemetery. It is a cool graveyard right by the sea beside the Castillo San Felipe. If you have time its interesting to check out. During the day we checked out several museums in Old San Juan and visited the cathedral while eating even more plantains.

San Juan cathedral

Day 4:

By day 4 I had had enough of Old San Juan and it was time to move on. After looking at the prices for tours around the island we decided to get a rental car. Tours to El Yunque Rainforest or Farjado were several hundred dollars per person whereas we could get a rental car for much less adn go wherever we liked. We got Progressive to pick us up! I had always seen on thee commercials that they would pick you up, and they will. We picked up our rental car and drove about an hour out of San Juan to the El Yunque Rainforest This is the only rainforest that is part of the U.S. park system. Definitely check it out. After checking out the park visitor’s center we hiked a trail to a waterfall and chilled on the rocks at the waterfall for awhile.

El Yunque has cool slugs

After that we got back in the car and drove along Highway 3 to Luquillo and stopped on the side of the road at the Luquillo Kiosks for some dinner. These are just some stands and kiosks that are in a little strip along the road beside the beach. We just walked up and down and bought little bits of food from different vendors because we wanted to try everything. You can get cheap authentic Puerto Rico food here.

El Yunque Rainforest

 

We then got back in the car to drive to Fajardo Bay to visit the BioBay. Puerto Rico is home to 3 of the world’s bioluminescent bays with the Fajardo Bio luminescent Bay being the most easily accessible to people vacationing on the northern part of the island. These bays are home to tiny microorganisms known as dinoflagellates that glow when they are disturbed in the water. As a result when a paddle go in the water and moves around the water will appear to glow where it is disturbed.

The Fajardo bay is protected and you cannot swim in the bay and you must go with a tour group. I’m usually all about saving money but I had to grit and fork over the money to go on this tour for about $100 per person. I didn’t want to miss out of glowing bioluminescent bays. Most of the tour groups take 2 groups each night, one earlier as the sun is setting and then one later on. I had chosen to go on the earlier one and had picked the night that the moon was supposed to be darkest.

To get to the bay you have to kayak through the mangroves. Prior to this I had thought I was bad at kayaking. However after meeting the others in my group and seeing their complete failure to go forward in one direction in a kayak I have concluded I’m not that bad at kayaking. Fortunately the sun was till setting while we were going through the mangroves so we could see where we were going.

Once we got to the bay we had to wait for the sun to completely set and for it to get dark. I had tried not to get too excited about the glow since I had heard the Fajardo bay wasn’t as bright as the one at Vieques. But as it got darker I started to see the flickering glow in the water. You can put your hand in for a second and splash around and the you’ll see the glow for a second like tiny fireflies. I found myself enchanted by these strange creatures in this bay. I found myself wondering what the people who first saw this thought. Did they think it was magic? I was reluctant to leave even though I was exhausted from hiking all day when it was time to paddle back out of the bay. Just as a warning, paddling through the mangroves in the dark is sort of terrifying. Its very hard to see where you are going (because its night time) and the people in front of us kept stopping, causing boats to crash into them and a bunch of boats would pile up together.

Day 5:

On day 5 we woke up early again to drive 2 hours west from San Juan to Camuy Caves. I had heard that you have to get there early or it could be so crowded that you wouldn’t be given admission. I’m not sure what that was based on because we got there around 11 and it wasn’t crowded at all. We bought our tickets and waited for the next tour group to start. It was about a 20 minute wait. Then we got our headsets and got on this little caravan trailer to be pulled to the caves. The headset tells you about everything that is going on.

As we got closer to the caves I felt like I was journeying to another planet. It started to feel like I was in the movie Avatar. I felt this even more when we actually got in the caves. They were absolutely astonishing. Completely worth the 2 hour drive to get there. The tour itself was about an hour long and you are escorted through by your tour guide and you also have your headset to tell you about different sites as you got to them. These caves were so gorgeous I really felt I was someplace magical. While we were in there we found the fountain of youth! (At least the tour guide said it was) I’m not convinced it was the actual fountain of youth but I was thirsty and daring so I drank from it. (I’ll let you know in 10 years if it really was the fountain of youth!)

Camuy Caves

After the caves we decided to head to the Arecibo telescope. The Arecibo telescope is really a humongous dish that is in the valley of these mountains in Puerto Rico. You’ve probably seen it in a couple of movies such as the 1995 James Bond movie or the movie Contact (1997). Until fairly recently it was the largest single dish radio telescope in the world. The coolest part is that scientists have been using it to talk to aliens! Well, send messages to aliens, no alien has talked back yet (that we know of). Still very cool. It was pretty crowded when we went so we had to park outside the of the entrance and hike up the mountain to get to the museum so be prepared to hike. Also we had to turn off our phones while we there. Which was just as well because our phones were roaming pretty badly and killing our batteries.

Note: This awesome telescope collapsed in 2020 and is no longer open.

Arecibo Telescope

There’s nothing like driving around the small winding mountain roads that makes me so grateful for the wide spacious roads that I normally get to drive on. We got a bit lost on the way back from the Arecibo telescope , partially due to the fact that our phones were dead and partially due to the fact that all the signs were in Español. As we found the main roads again we found ourselves next to a grocery store! I love going to grocery stores in foreign countries (ok, Puerto Rico is technically a U.S. Territory). You always get to see cool products and stock up on authentic local snacks for a fraction of the price that you pay at all the tourist destinations. We stocked up on snacks for the rest of the trip and headed back to San Juan to check into our resort.

Days 6 & 7:

We spent the last 2 1/2 days of our vacation at the Caribe Hilton resort. After days and days of going nonstop we needed a few days of rest and restoration. This place was pretty awesome with a private beach area and a garden with iguanas and birds. At the end of the dock they even had a coral reef you could look down at! It was pretty amazing. We spent days lounging around being “normal” tourists (except for the cheap snacks we had in our room we got from the grocery store, banana juice anyone?) I’m normally not a hug fan of resorts because I get bored so easily but it was the perfect way to end our vacation in Puerto Rico!

Resort view

Time to go home!

At the end of week it was time to go home and back to our normal lives. But our journey through Puerto Rico was amazing. As an update, this trip was taken shortly before the hurricane Maria devastated the island of Puerto Rico. I am supremely grateful that I had the opportunity to see such a beautiful place before the disaster hit. I hope they are able to restore it to all of its glory and it looks like they are slowly but surely on track to do just that.

Save Money by Artificially Making Yourself Poor

I always hear people talk about how hard it is for them to save money. People are always saying that things cost too much and that there isn’t a enough money to save extra at the end of the day. Now this is coming from people who are making $80k or $100k. That is above the average household income in the United States. This doesn’t make much sense to me because there are plenty of households that make much less than this and still manage to get by. So how do I save money?

For me I’ve forced myself to save by creating an environment where I feel poor. Years ago, when I was in college I lived in a truly impoverished state with very low income and high bills (thanks rising tuition). Even though I was essentially living on about $600 dollars a month I made it work through creative applications. I didn’t feel poor even though by all standards I was. After graduating and getting a real “grown-up” job I was careful to avoid lifestyle inflation. How did I do this? By forcing myself to be poor.

When I got my first paycheck after college I remember being shocked at how much money it was. I remember some of my friends saying similar things to me when they first started getting a paycheck. Everyone wondered “What am I supposed to do with all this money?” I think most people start off this way when they aren’t used to managing that much money. But people figure it out and the initial amazement at how are they going to spend all this money turns to “how could I afford to save money, I spend everything I get?” This is due to lifestyle inflation. It can start off small, with a new fancy house and a new car, but then it turns to an even bigger house, dinners out several times a week, Uber rides all over time, new clothes, the newest gadgets, show tickets, and last minute plane tickets to cool festivals. And suddenly they need to make more money, because there isn’t any left at the end of the day. After all, its their money, haven’t they earned it?

I had a similar thought, but I knew that I wanted to pay off my higher interest students loans first. I figured that the money I was earning wasn’t really mine since I had so much debt. And I knew I had a lot of expenses coming up. My computer I had used through college was dying, my car was to the point where something broke in it every few months and I was pretty sure it wouldn’t pass an inspection. My boyfriend had proposed, so I had a wedding to pay for. I had $37k in student debt, and I knew that I didn’t have anyone to fall back on if I had money problems. So instead of inflating my lifestyle to my paycheck, I got to work on a budget and money plan.

Beware the urge to shop!

From day one, I put aside part of my check for retirement. I didn’t want to get used to seeing that money in my bank account. If I never got it, I couldn’t miss it, right? I had heard that many young professionals don’t contribute to their retirement at the beginning because they figure they need to get an emergency find first and retirement is a long way off. But when you take this approach, the few months you were going to not contribute to retirement turn into years and before you know it you’ve lost out on decades worth of compounding interest! I wasn’t going to allow myself to fall into that trap.

After that, I set aside the money for my essential costs, built up a small emergency fund in a separate savings account, and every other penny went to debts. I had in effect, artificially made myself poor. Even though I had a nice paycheck coming in, I never saw it. This allowed me to avoid lifestyle inflation because I physically couldn’t inflate my lifestyle because I had no money to do it.

This turned out to be my savior. Even though lifestyle inflation has certainly happened to us (living off $600 per month is rather uncomfortable) we have kept our spending at about 30% of our income. And we do this by not even considering spending above the budget that we’ve set for ourselves. And it works pretty well. We don’t have to have endless self-control with our money, because we’ve set up our lives so that we never see that money. You can do the same. Here are some tips.

How to Artificially Make Yourself Poor to Make Yourself Rich in Reality

  1. Paycheck deductions.
    Whenever you can, make the payments to your retirement accounts come from your paycheck before you ever get it. This makes it so that you never see this money in your bank account so you don’t ever miss it. Depending on your health care plan or what your employer offers you can do this with other expenses as well like health care premiums, flexible spending accounts, or HSAs. My employer even offers an account that deducts from your paycheck for putting money aside for childcare or elder care. Most of these deductions are tax advantaged as well so take advantage of what you can. The goal is to shrink your paycheck before you ever see it for things you needed to buy or fund anyway.
  2. Use separate accounts for savings vs spending.
    Have one account that has the money going into it you are actually allowed to spend for the month. Everything else should go into a separate account so that you don’t even think about spending it.
  3. Get rid of the extra money.
    If you have leftover money after paying for budgeted items get rid of the money. Don’t just let it sit in your account, tempting you to spend it. Use it to make extra payments to debts or move it into a brokerage account where you can invest it. Out of sight, out of mind when it comes to money.

Hope these tips help you as they have helped me and my family!

Finding Happiness Through Gratitude

Today I’d like to write about happiness. Many people want it, but so many people don’t find it. It sometimes feels like this elusive creature that everyone else has but you don’t. I used to feel that way. I used to be downright miserable. But now I’m not. I used to suffer from depression.

I now have complete strangers comment on how happy I am. Others say that I always have a smile on my face. Am I faking it? No. I really am this happy. But it doesn’t come naturally. I have to work to stay happy.

The secret to happiness is GRATITUDE. That’s right. Happiness has little to do with what you have in life or rather what you don’t have. Happiness has to do with how you perceive the life you do have.

My favorite holiday is Thanksgiving. I love gathering with my family with delicious food and seeing everyone. But my favorite part is right before we eat. We all hold hands and say what we’re grateful for. Many years ago back when I was unhappy I never knew what to say when it was my turn, because deep down I wasn’t thankful. I felt entitled and neglected by the life I had and truly wasn’t grateful in a real sense for anything. Now when its my turn I have to cut my list short and only say a few things I’m grateful for because my real list is a mile long.

How to practice gratitude in your everyday life

You can start off small. I did. I remember looking out at this field on the side of the road. It was such a pretty shade of green and the grass was the perfect length and I realized that I thought it was beautiful. And I thought about all the hard work someone had to do to get that field to be its current state that I could enjoy it. Someone had mowed it, perhaps planted the grass too, hard work had gone into making that. And now it was a nice field for me to walk in, or play sports in, and generally enjoy. And I felt gratitude to those things that led that field to be there.

There are things like this you can be grateful for everyday! The world is full of amazing things that other people had to do to make them that way. Every time you turn on a light (electricity!), every time you eat (no famine!), every time you have running water even those are things to be insanely grateful for.

agricultural field with sun

what a beautiful field

 

Doesn’t money affect happiness?

 

Yes, money does seem to make a difference in happiness levels overall. But that seems to be because there’s a threshold where you have enough to take care of your basic needs. After that, money doesn’t really matter in happiness. There was a study that found that people only became happier for emotional well-being up to $60,000 to $75,000 a year in earnings. After that more money didn’t make people happier. In fact they found that happiness could even decrease after $95,000 in earnings a year. More importantly they established that the cause of this unhappiness was due to people tying up their self-worth in status and financial earnings. In other words, they were unhappy because they compared themselves to others and focused on what they didn’t have instead of being grateful for the things they did have.

Overall, I believe that I found the secret to happiness and the secret to happiness is gratitude. Pure and simple.

Finding Happiness Through Gratitude

Today I’d like to write about happiness. Many people want it, but so many people don’t find it. It sometimes feels like this elusive creature that everyone else has but you don’t. I used to feel that way. I used to be downright miserable. But now I’m not. I used to suffer from depression.

I now have complete strangers comment on how happy I am. Others say that I always have a smile on my face. Am I faking it? No. I really am this happy. But it doesn’t come naturally. I have to work to stay happy.

The secret to happiness is GRATITUDE. That’s right. Happiness has little to do with what you have in life or rather what you don’t have. Happiness has to do with how you perceive the life you do have.

My favorite holiday is Thanksgiving. I love gathering with my family with delicious food and seeing everyone. But my favorite part is right before we eat. We all hold hands and say what we’re grateful for. Many years ago back when I was unhappy I never knew what to say when it was my turn, because deep down I wasn’t thankful. I felt entitled and neglected by the life I had and truly wasn’t grateful in a real sense for anything. Now when its my turn I have to cut my list short and only say a few things I’m grateful for because my real list is a mile long.

How to practice gratitude in your everyday life

You can start off small. I did. I remember looking out at this field on the side of the road. It was such a pretty shade of green and the grass was the perfect length and I realized that I thought it was beautiful. And I thought about all the hard work someone had to do to get that field to be its current state that I could enjoy it. Someone had mowed it, perhaps planted the grass too, hard work had gone into making that. And now it was a nice field for me to walk in, or play sports in, and generally enjoy. And I felt gratitude to those things that led that field to be there.

There are things like this you can be grateful for everyday! The world is full of amazing things that other people had to do to make them that way. Every time you turn on a light (electricity!), every time you eat (no famine!), every time you have running water even those are things to be insanely grateful for.

Beautiful agricultural field
what a beautiful field
Doesn’t money affect happiness?

 

Yes, money does seem to make a difference in happiness levels overall. But that seems to be because there’s a threshold where you have enough to take care of your basic needs. After that, money doesn’t really matter in happiness. There was a study that found that people only became happier for emotional well-being up to $60,000 to $75,000 a year in earnings. After that more money didn’t make people happier. In fact they found that happiness could even decrease after $95,000 in earnings a year. More importantly they established that the cause of this unhappiness was due to people tying up their self-worth in status and financial earnings. In other words, they were unhappy because they compared themselves to others and focused on what they didn’t have instead of being grateful for the things they did have.

Overall, I believe that I found the secret to happiness and the secret to happiness is gratitude. Pure and simple.

Having a Pet Is Like Having a Kid, but Worse

This post is going to highlight an unpopular opinion. Pets are extremely popular. These days people are putting off having a baby longer and longer. So it makes sense that we would fill our lives with adorable friendly critters. A lot of people say that these pets are less responsibility than a child and while that is true there are a lot more similarities than you would think. Let’s get started.

1. They wake you up in the middle of the night.

I still remember my shock when my college roommates decided to adopt a cat. My shock was mostly over the loud yowling noise that this cat made right outside my bedroom door. At 2am. And then again at 5am. And then again at 8am as I was trying to sleep in after a night of troubled sleep from all of the yowling. I had heard that babies could wake you up every 3 hours and that you got no sleep once you had kids, but a cat? Sure, he was cute. But not that cute. And then again just the other day my co worker was talking about how he had had to get up at 5 am and one other time during the night. I heard another one of my coworkers reply sympathetically, “Yeah, its so hard when they’re young.” Imagine my surprise that they weren’t talking about a kid, but instead they were talking about his new puppy. Yes, babies cry and wake you up at night but at least its temporary. Its not like they do that forever.

2. You have to clean up their poop.

When a dog poops when you’re going for a walk or you’re in the dog park you can’t just leave it there, you’ve gotta scoop it up and throw it away. When your cat uses the litter box, you have to empty it. I even had to clean up the poop of my little rat when I cleaned her cage. With babies yes you have to change their diapers. But then around age 2 they get potty trained and you don’t have to clean up their poop anymore. With pets, you’re cleaning up their poop for their entire lives.

puppy
He is contemplating what to chew on next

3. They’re not your flesh and blood.

It’s one thing to take care of a small helpless individual when that thing caries your genes within you. There’s something instinctual about continuing your genes. You can watch the child grow and develop and you see little pieces of yourself in them. With a pet, all of this care you give them isn’t going towards continue your genetic line.

4. They destroy your stuff.

I’m always hearing my friends complain that they’d like to buy nice things but then they sigh and say they can’t because their dog would destroy it. Another one of my friends is always having to buy new shoes because her shoes are always being chewed up by her dog. But I think the most shocking story was what someone’s cat did. They had left their wedding dress hanging up in their closet. When they came back the cat had completely torn the wedding dress to shreds. Wedding dresses are not cheap. Children will also destroy your stuff but not to the degree that a cat with sharp claws and a serious texture aversion/obsession.

cat
I am up to no good

5. They are expensive.

The average amount spent on pet ownership per year in the U.S. was $1,191 in 2015. That’s pretty expensive. Let’s assume that you had a dog. Dog breeds can live anywhere from 10-15 years depending on the breed. If you do some back of the napkin math that could be $17,865 over the life of the dog! But of course children can also be pretty expensive as well. But also you get tax credits for having kids when they’re young and there’s even a chance that your kids will help take of you one day when you’re older! There aren’t any tax advantages for having a pet that I know of. Veterinary care can also be very expensive. Child healthcare doesn’t have to be that expensive either. Just for example, with my husband’s health insurance it would cost a big whopping $0 dollars to add a child to our health insurance policy a year because we’re already on a family plan with the 2 of us.

6. You can always change your mind.

Everyone talks about the financial responsibility and commitment that having a kid is since you have to take care of them for 18 years. People argue that with a pet you can always get rid of it if you decide you don’t like it. But I have good news! For a limited time you can return a baby if you decide you don’t like it! Most states have safe haven laws that allow someone to drop off a baby with no questions asked! In Nebraska for a time you could drop off a child of any age. With pets at any time you can surrender your pet to a rescue, post a craigslist ad, or rehome them with a fiend or family member. Of course, giving up a child or a pet is always a serious decision not to be taken lightly and always with the best interest of the welfare of the child or pet.

Overall, having a pet is quite a responsibility. For many they can be great sources of fun and can help you relax. But they also can be very time consuming and quite a hassle. Even my little rats take quite a time commitment! Between playing with them, making sure they get exercise, and cleaning up, they take a lot of my free time. And while they are adorable, maybe my time would be better spent doing other things. My intent with this article is simply to highlight that there a lot more similarities between having a pet and a child and in a lot of the circumstances the cons of having a pet are a lot like the cons of having a child but without the best pros of having a child. But both pets and children sure are cute though!

cute rat
Even these cuties are a hand full

What is FOMO and How Does It Affect Your Finances?

A new term has come up in the last few years is FOMO. FOMO, or the Fear Of Missing Out, occurs when someone is overcome with anxiety that they could be missing out on social events or experiences that others are having. According to reports, FOMO is crippling and affecting the Millennial generation like a plague that they just can’t shake off.

With the prevalence of social media in our society today, its easy to see all of the cool things that everyone is up to and feel jealous or even envious. My social media page is full of posts from people going on weekend getaways, friends smiling together in bars, people taking awesome trips all over the world, cool food that’s in restaurants. Someone else is always going to a concert, attending a play, a sports game, buying a newer bigger house, or wearing the newest trendiest clothes. It’s hard to get away from reminders that someone somewhere is doing something cool that you’re not doing. When looking at these reminders or hearing theses stories its easy to get caught up in feelings of inadequacy, because maybe you feel your life isn’t as cool.

FOMO can make you try to keep up with the never ending cascade of things that others are doing. The other day, I logged onto my Facebook and within minutes I found several friends talking about awesome trip to New York City. I even felt jealous for a second and wished that I was the one taking that cool trip to new York City over weekend. I wondered was I squandering my time by not going to all these places? I had went from being perfectly happy and content to questioning why I didn’t have an awesome photo to post about my weekend.

 

This concert may be awesome, but it isn't worth bankruptcy
This concert may be awesome, but it isn’t worth bankruptcy…

But I can’t look at it that way. Because my life is not a performance to be judged on how many likes I can get or how cool of a reaction I get when I tell someone else what has happened in my life. Its important to focus on yourself and what makes you happy.

I can see that in some of my friends that FOMO has overtaken them. It just hasn’t brought them to new places though. Its brought them to a race where they can never keep up. Because there will always be another cool restaurant to eat at. There will always be somewhere else to visit, another great game or concert. There will always be the newest trends, and a new model of the iPhone. They can never keep up. And the worst thing that FOMO has done is that it has drained their wallets. It has robbed them from a future of financially security and in some cases, it sets people up for a lifetime of crushing debt, trouble saving, and living paycheck to paycheck.

So I implore you. Say no to FOMO. It is more important to focus on every day joys in life. Fear of missing out? No not me. I’m not afraid of missing whatever the newest craze is. I’m more afraid of being a slave to a job and being financially dependent where I don’t have the freedom to try new things. I’m afraid of not taking a moment out of each day to stop appreciate all of the wonderful things I have. At the end of the day, all of those things are just a distraction. A distraction from the simple things in life that don’t cost a penny.

In Honor of Mother’s Day, On Not Being a Mother Yet

Originally written May 2018

On a day where we celebrate Mothers everywhere and tell our Mothers how much they mean to us – I’m just sad. Because I’m not a Mother. I’ve wanted to be a Mother since the moment that I first got my period. With my fertility came a wave of maternalism that has never abated. I was the little girl who played hard core baby dolls and always pretended to have a huge family. There was nothing I ever wanted more than to be a Mother. I’ve always been slightly obsessed with babies. My husband realized this early into dating me. We were walking in the grocery store I saw a mother with her newborn baby. I whispered to my then boyfriend, “Look at it. Its new!” I proclaimed with a triumphant smile. When I see them I can’t help but break into a smile. Babies have that effect on me.

I spend days day dreaming about babies. I walk slowly through the baby department at every store, looking wistfully at the tiny outfits. I look at the baby food and diapers. I dream about babies. When I go places, I wonder would a little kid like it here? How much fun it would be to have a little one here with me I think.
But I am not a mother.

When I see my nieces and nephews I pick them up. I shower them with hugs and kisses. I bring them stickers to play with and I fix them snacks. I soothe my niece’s tears when she cries and then at the end of the weekend after visiting them I reluctantly go back to my own life where there are no small children. And I am not a mother.
I spend my free time reading mommy blogs and articles on fun, free things to do with your kids. I read up on how to travel with your kids, how to cook for kids, how children learn. One of my main interests is pregnancy. I read anything I can get my hands on about pregnancy. I must have read a dozen books on fertility and pregnancy. I have virtually toured all of the hospital maternity wings and birthing centers within a 50 mile radius of my house (theres actually quite a few). I read baby name blogs and make lists of names that I think sound nice with our last names. I track my fertility every month and read about diets and herbs that help you get pregnant.

But I am not pregnant. I have never been pregnant. I’m not even trying to get pregnant.

I am married. I am educated and have a college degree. We have a house and a small furry animal named Cleo. We both have good jobs that pay well. We have excellent insurance. We are in a great financial situation. We have roots and are settled. But I am not a mother.

After reading all of this, you may ask why? Why are you not a Mother? Why are you not even trying to be a Mother? That question is hard. Because my baby fever rages in me and tells me to become a mother immediately. But the world around me tells me something else. Its is full of articles like “Please Stop Asking Me When I’m Going to Have Children” and how kids ruin your life. There’s article after article about how the millennials do not want children. Long lists of reasons why its better to be child-free. I have heard my friends express similar sentiments. And then there’s me. I feel like I’m some strange weirdo for wanting a baby. When I remarked that I didn’t think I’d be getting another cat or dog because I thought it would be too much if we had a baby with more pets my friends looked at me like I had grown another head. And I’m afraid. Because as sure of myself I feel, so much could go wrong. What if the baby isn’t healthy? What if my body is damaged forever? What if I’m not able to financially take care of it? What if I never travel again? There’s so many experiences I want to have.

And so I wait. Me and my husband wait. While we have another year of saving money (I’ve heard kids are expensive!). Another year of traveling to new places. Another year of sleeping in and having spare time to write and work on hobbies. Another year of not needing a baby sitter. I try to live in the moment and live life to the fullest, but then I think about my baby. My baby that doesn’t exist. And I have a pang of sadness.