A Transparent Juxtaposition of Life and Debt

Friday, July 29th, 2011, 3:00PM - I’m at Jill’s house. Jill peers over my shoulder and stares at the computer screen for a moment then says, “Let’s sign up for a credit card and rack up a pizza debt!”

I currently owe a total of $1,387.13. That’s all.

Jill announces that it’s “pizza time” and we sit on the couch stuffing our faces and half-heartedly watching RuPaul’s Drag U. I talk wistfully about that job at the children’s museum that I applied for. Did I say too much when I introduced myself to the director in passing? Oh, God. What was I wearing? No, that’s a silly thing to worry about. I had kids with me. She’ll understand. If I had that job, I could live downtown and walk to work every day and I’d be skinny again! Ooh, or maybe I could learn to ride a bike in the city…

Jill tells me she’s dirty and I say that I am too. She says no, not that kind of dirty. Then she explains that last night at 2AM, she had sex with Andrew in a park while I was sleeping. I am mildly annoyed. Who does that? Aren’t we too old for that? I change the subject to debt and she doesn’t have much to say.

There are two reasons I don’t have a lot of debt. The first reason is that I am poor. I filled out the FAFSA form and flunked out of community college my first year on the government’s dime. Then I moved back home and worked full time making eight bucks an hour at a call center job for a year. Then I filled out the FAFSA form again; grants took care of most of it and I was able to pay the rest. I worked part time at my department store high school job for two years while I got my associate degree in Liberal Arts. Then I moved to Philadelphia where I worked at an after school program, as a telemarketer, and a photography intern for a blog and a music venue.

Jill and I head to Baltimore. There’s an Alphabet Bombers reunion show at the Sidebar. There’s also an anime convention so I know my college friends are in town. We try to listen to Save Ferris in the car but the disk is so scratched that there’s no use. Instead, we listen to Eastern Standard Time. We skip all of the songs without words because what’s the point if you can’t sing along? I realize that I am happy because it’s just so much better to have two people singing in the car than just one. I tell Jill this and she agrees.

The second reason I don’t have a lot of debt is because my grandmother took it for me. I fell down some steps and broke my arm pretty bad. I ended up having to quit my jobs and move back in with my mom so someone could take care of me. I had to have surgery and months of physical therapy; I couldn’t move my whole upper body for a while. I didn’t have insurance so for months, I would receive bills that were impossible to pay. I tried my best to fill out the paperwork for the individual parties but it was just too much. I came to a point where I would just lay in bed and cry because I couldn’t deal with it. That’s when my grandmother put the bills in her name and started paying them. She’s still paying them and I feel guilty.

We stand on the sidewalk outside the bar, just the two of us. All around us are little circles of people; some we know, some we don’t. None of them talk to us. We can look at each other and know that the other is thinking about what it means to belong to a community. We start talking about “the old days”. About DCska shows. About before Dan died. Jill tells me that when she used to go to shows back then, she felt like her presence was always appreciated. I tell her that back then, I used to walk into a room and everyone would hug me. We both start talking about my 21st birthday party. Everyone was there! We drank milkshakes at Fuddruckers in Chinatown, Mrs. Jones brought me a pie, the Pietasters played a surprise set, the Debonaires and the Ready Steady Go! played…

The Ready Steady Go! was Dan’s band. There is an awkward silence as we both struggle to hold back tears. Jill tells me that she didn’t know how to deal with his cancer. She says she should have visited him but…..and there is more silence. She says you can’t even ask “how are you” because the answer is obvious. I tell her that I was upset because no one bothered to tell me how bad it was and that I was also angry at myself for being so wrapped up in my own life that I didn’t notice. We’re trying very hard not to cry out on the sidewalk in front of the punks, skinheads, and rockabilly girls but we fail. We cry.

After my arm healed, I tried to go back to Philadelphia but it didn’t work. I felt defeated and abandoned. I hid in my friend’s basement and cried for two weeks then went home and filled out a FAFSA form and took a year of business and marketing courses at community college while I figured out what to do next.

The Alphabet Bombers play. The skinheads roughhouse, we dance, I take photos. We smile at each other when we hear Rich talk in his throaty rockabilly voice. We wiggle our fingers at Alex during his guitar solos. We think Curt is cute but we assume he knows it and that makes him kind of a jerk. AJ stands in front of the stage with his arms crossed during the last song and we think he’s a jerk, too. Just like old times.

But also very different.

I applied to just one university; the cheapest, closest place where I could study marketing, communication, and nonprofits. I received full financial aid through FAFSA as well as a $5,000 scholarship. Between the two, that covered my entire tuition cost. I quit my job as a preschool teacher and moved to one of the richest counties in the nation where I paid $820/month for rent in a shared townhome within walking distance of the school. I took out $5,500 in loans to help pay for my initial living expenses. I completed university in a year and a half and was accepted into a nonprofit leadership graduate program where all students work research assistantships in their field.

Well, yeah. Of course I want things to be like they used to be. They just can’t, though. All the people have changed. Jill reminds me that Alex hasn’t changed. I agree but then remind her that he is married, makes a living doing art, and is much more social than he used to be. He has changed….for the better. Jill tells me when Dan got sick and the shows stopped happening, that’s when she turned to drugs. I tell her that I wish I could undo the social knowledge academia and living in the DC area gave me; I understood what it meant to make less than $30,000 in a year and I was obsessed with it. I told her that I know how much it costs to buy a house and that I want to buy one. I told her that I hated the fact that I felt like I needed more degrees in order to overcome the inferiority complex that college gave me. How do we get back to the way it felt when we went to shows? How do we get back to that sense of carefree-ness, community, and joy?

I moved home and worked as a nanny in the next town over. It felt so good to tell people that I was going to graduate school but day by day, I began to worry more and more. Funding will come in April, they’d say. No, wait. They’re announcing assistantships in May. Our departmental budget will be approved at the end of June. I went to orientation which was nothing more than a job interview in disguise. My peers were dressed in suits and came from jobs in Washington and New York. Others were fresh out of Americorps or the Peace Corps. My heart sank; I knew I couldn’t compete. Instead of giving up hope right then and there, I listened to my family, friends, and the people at the university; I believed them when they said there would be a job and funding for me. I bought a bike and put a down payment on the perfect place to live.

We call my college friends to hang out but they are too drunk or lazy to bother with us. I tell Jill that things changed after my last birthday. I felt unappreciated so I stopped calling. They never called me. It was awkward. Jill says she wants to go to a strip club. I say I don’t want to go without a guy but she pressures me into walking to Baltimore Street anyway. Men holler at her as if I’m invisible. A man in pink pants is speaking softly to her in Crazy John’s then hands her his cell phone and tells her to put her number in. I slap his hand away and yell at him. He curses at me and says he didn’t know that was my girl. I realize that I am the only white skinned person in the room and I am not invisible anymore.

Many men try to get Jill’s attention on the sidewalk. One succeeds. He tells her that Asian girls make a lot of money in the clubs. Jill says that she went to college. The man says that many of his girls are paying their way through college by dancing. Not even dancing! Hosting! They just get paid to sit there and talk to men. No dancing, no touching. As many drinks as you want, the bartender will take care of you. The girls make their own schedules; they come and go as they please. You wanna disappear for a month and come back? Fine. I see her eyes light up. I try to cover my annoyance with concern but there’s nothing I can say. He says his name is Mr. Hollywood and she programs his number into her phone.

The assistantship never came and neither did the funding. Administration wanted me to continue playing this little game telling me that I would probably get something once I started taking classes. Tuition and fees for the first year would cost around $40,000 and that’s not counting any sort of living expenses. There was no way I could do it; not only would I have a massive amount of debt for a NONprofit degree, but I would also risk having a graduate degree with no practical experience in the field. I called it off two weeks before I was supposed to move.

At age 27, I’m living with my mother in Culpeper, Virginia and working as a full time nanny. I apply for nonprofit and higher education jobs all the time but I haven’t had any luck. I’m paying $300-$400 per semester to take more marketing courses just for fun at the local community college. I’ve paid my loan down to $1,387.13 and hope to have $20,000 in the bank by next August for graduate school. If I don’t get a deal I like this time, I’m going to save for an additional year and buy a house. I feel as if I make the right decisions financially but as a result of not taking risks, I suffer socially.

On the way home, Jill tries to justify working at a strip club. I’m not sure what to say. Don’t you want something more than that? Don’t you want to learn and use skills? She tells me that she’s been a hostess and promo model before and she does use skills. I tell her that’s not what I mean. I try to make it clear that it’s not a moral thing but in my head I’m wondering if it is. I finally blurt out that I don’t want her relapsing; that she told me herself that sometimes she’s not sure if she does things because she wants to do them or if someone else wants her to do them. A strip club in Baltimore is not a good place for a recovering addict.

She changes the subject; asks if I want to talk about debt. I say yes. We make small talk about credit cards and then I ask her how much debt she has. She reluctantly tells me. Things are quiet for the rest of the ride home.