timrehix: Maudlin Thinking

timrehix (

timrehix) wrote,
@ 2008-04-21 15:38:00

Current mood:

depressed

Maudlin Thinking
I want to go to college. I think about it all the time. The other night I had a dream I was talking to an admissions person. It’s just a lot of money I don’t have. The last school I talked to about taking online classes and it cost $1,200.00 for a three credit class.

The ideal situation would be to quit my job and go to school in the classroom full time. This is impossible.

If I go back to school it will probably be with a huge loan and one class at a time online while working full time.

Blake is in school. He is about to start on his masters degree. He will be going to school full time and working full time. I am barely working full time and the idea of doing this and going to school at all stresses me out. I hate being supported by my boyfriend, I feel like a leach. I could handle being supported by my parents, I would still feel like a leach but they have a genetic connection, where as with Blake I feel like I am using him for his money.

When I look in to the future I see myself fat, bald, ugly, and homeless laying in a gutter. Blake doesn’t like it when I say that I am going to grow up to be a hobo because he says it makes him think I want to break up with him. That makes me think about how I couldn’t afford to live on my own, and that leads to me being a leach, with leads to feelings of worthlessness which lead to the hobo image.

I think I would like to live on my own. I like the idea of starting with an empty home and slowly filling it with my stuff. As the space gets filled it becomes more and more me. But I don’t want to leave Blake. Every year I want that tinny apartment more and more. I look around my house and it is filled with Blake’s things and Blake’s history. I am in there but it’s like an addendum to Blake’s journey through life instead of my own. In reality it is Blake’s house not mine. Even if I did move out I would barely be able to afford rent, not to mention utilities, car, food, or college.

I am 26 years old. Assuming I live to be 80 years old. I figure I will probably be an old fogity man for the last 20. I imagine my uncle Eddie, a man who stopped living long before he died. He had diabetes and bowel control issues. So I have lived almost half my substantial years already. I figure things really get started after college. That’s when you start working in you chosen vocation, start making some money and because I don’t plan on having kids, start making the disposable income needed to follow my passions, like going to Europe. I would love to travel. But the longer I wait to start college the older I will be when I finish, and the less time I will have to be an adult in my prime.

I realize I could live to be 102 in perfect health or get hit by a truck tomorrow, but I still feel like I am being delayed. And that expiration date is looming out there some where, and I am being dragged to it. I want to accomplish something amazing before I kick. It doesn’t have to be a big amazing like a best selling book or finding a cure for something. It can be just a little amazing like waking up in a hotel room just in time to see a sun rise over Paris on a spur of the moment trip.

I have been in a funk lately. Maybe it will pass. I think I am having a mid life crisis. Of course that makes me think of 40 year olds buying new cars, which makes me wonder where I will be when I am 40. Will I have a new car? Or will I be sleeping in a gutter some where?

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jadewik
2008-04-21 09:55 pm UTC (link)

It doesn't matter when you decide to go to school-- it's always better to do it now than later-- especially with tuition rising yearly. The longer you wait to go back-to-school makes it more difficult too because you're less in the "student groove" and you remember less of your early vocational training. I would really advocate focusing on school. The difference in pay grade alone is worth seeking higher education (My income multiplied by 6 after college). If Blake is the sort of fellow I think he is, he'd understand if you went to school and "mooched" off him a little... because at least if you're going to school, you're showing him initiative.

In your circumstances, I'd look at going to a community college. Tuition is substantially cheaper; and, even if you can't get a bachelor's there, you can at the very least get an associates that will transfer should you decide to expand your vocational training further.

I'd wait on getting your own place if you're serious about going back to school. You're already used to having a larger income than someone who transitions directly from HighSchool to college. That right there will provide some challenges as you adjust your current lifestyle and cost of living to match that of a college student. And if you go get your own place, you will place yourself in even less of a position to return to school. It's also the reason a lot of people have roommates in college-- to split the bills and bring the cost of living down.

Student loans have very low interest rates. I have 1.5% interest on my loans, though it did used to be 3.5%. I should have them payed off in less than 5 years. Student loans help balance out the cost of tuition and the time you'd have to take off of work and put into studies. Obviously, if you're putting yourself through school, you will still have to work. You CAN be a full-time student and still work 30-35 hours a week. I pulled 18 credits and +30 hrs of work my senior year (with Pneumonia)... so I can certainly say it's possible, though you really have to focus on school and it does take some effort to balance your schedule with some fun activities as well.

You're never too old to go back to school. My husband is 26.5 years old. He's going to the community college to get an associate's degree (he changed his major a couple times)... so I know how you feel about being "too old" because I hear it from him a lot. However, I'd rather have him going to school to earn a degree because even if his school costs, the potential gain is worth more than what we're putting into his education now.

If you're really serious about going back to school-- DO IT. There's no time like the present, so seize the day! =D

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tingirl
2008-04-21 10:55 pm UTC (link)

Let me second the community college option. You can get a working degree (medical tech, or whatever might interest you enough to do for a while) and get a "real" job making enough money to get your own place or help finance college. And don't forget there's tons of financial aid, sometimes in really weird places.

I hear you louder than you're talking on the shared-housing thing. It's taken me most of the last ten years to make our place into OUR place, and I went crazy often along the way. Is there anything you could do to make the place more homey for yourself? A space you could carve out, pics you could hang, anything? Is it just knowing you *can't* have your own apartment making it seem desperate?

There are acres of options, I swear. Feel free to email me to brainstorm and commiserate about desperation finances and surviving as the financially less empowered partner (because I don't know about you, but when it comes to young long term couples in my area, there's...um..me and Jason. And that's it.).

Also, Happy Fun Spaz here reminds you disability doesn't mean your life is over. I am honestly having more fun in the last two years since my health went to pot than in the double decade before. So don't let the Spectre of Ill Health get you down.

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ot_atma
2008-04-22 02:26 pm UTC (link)

+1

I can't talk about shared housing, really.

But the spectre of ill health is nothing to fear. Look at Stephen Hawking. The thing that impresses me most about him is not his Godlike intellect or his consistently groundbreaking work in physics. (okay, though, those are pretty damn cool.)

It's the internal toughness that lets him survive more than two decades beyond the doctor's estimate, despite hardly being able to twitch a muscle for the vast majority of that time span. I don't think being smart has anything to do with that.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

therabitt
2008-04-22 02:09 am UTC (link)

Also, look into vocational training for a tradeskill instead of a degree. That might be an option you've overlooked. Often times the training period for those is shorter and the training itself is cheaper, though more time and effort is put into making it from apprentice to journeyman to master, etc. Could you see yourself as a chef? electrician? mechanic? refrigeration tech? nurse's assistant? vet tech? carpenter? Go explore those choices, too, cause there's more than I listed. Vocational schools offer job placement services to help you get that experience to go from beginner to intermediate.

And, I know you're prolly gonna shoot this down - military. Don't ask, don't tell. There are blatantly gay men and women in the military, like The Birdcage flaming gay. No one says anything, no one asks, no one tells, we all get along at work. I've been to school under two individuals' instruction, and I work under another individual right now. The education benefits are very good, even for reservists. The down side is that Blake can't go with you when you get stationed somewhere if you are full on active duty, another perk for reservists. I also mention these things for other folks reading this, feel free to ask me about it.

Either way, shake yourself out of your funk and tell Blake how you feel about these things. He's your partner, right? Let him help support you more than financially. Finding a mutual solution can be empowering for you both and bring you closer.

(Reply to this)(Thread)

	rubyredrose 2008-04-22 05:50 pm UTC (link)
	I second the trade skill school. Unless you're wanting to do office work, or go into a management type of position, the tradeschool thing would be more long term useful for jobs, as well as being more likely to be a skill that would be useful for you personally. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	timrehix 2008-04-22 11:59 pm UTC (link)
	I want web design (Reply to this)(Parent)

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