mercurial scribe

I do not think I have fully appreciated the concept of an Emergency Fund until now. It’s been 2 months since I’ve brought home any income due to my little Worker’s Comp situation and my goodness a healthy emergency fund would have helped us tremendously!

Most of those financial experts Google will refer you to suggest 3-6 months of living expenses stashed somewhere. Now, as a relatively average American, YEAH RIGHT! I’m already on a tight enough budget and now you want me to manage to save up to half of our annual income to be stashed for a future emergency when we’re trying to scrape by as it is?! (more…)

It’s hard enough struggling through this illness and trying to be able just to pay the bills, let alone not get into debt. But alas, we have and it sucked.

Though we’re on our way to being free of owing anyone a dime, it’s still been a spotty process for me. Quite the pain in the ass actually. Why?

Because we’re applying for an apartment today.

i’m so terrified and humiliated at the thought that my spotty credit history may keep us from a beautiful, nearly perfect apartment. Mom has been so great in doing everything she can to help us during this difficult time. Justin has been working his tail off to ensure at least one steady paycheck is coming in and the Gimpy McHobble that i am is taken care of.

This is the side of debt management and credit repair that i rarely hear about. There’s a shame to it though i know i’ve done the best i can. So much of our debt over the past few years has been accumulated just so we could stay afloat when i wasn’t yet stable brain-wise. As i fight the feeling of dread, i try to remind myself that our current apartment complex is owned by the same property management company and that will probably help our case greatly.

In the meanwhile, my appreciation of good credit is greatly increasing.

Happy bill paying!

Consider it a Mother’s Day present and a really dramatic way to get out of debt.

That’s right, folks of the internet: my mother is moving in with us.

Perhaps that’s not the best way to put it. We - Mom, Justin and i - are in the process of looking for an apartment together so that we can all get out of debt. She’s something like several grand in the hole and sinking; our struggle has been slow but progressing.

Let us start where the story does: we hate our apartment complex. This is no secret. It’s expensive, it’s noisy and the 885 sq ft apartment with a wall air conditioner in Southern California is NOT worth the $1105 a month, not to mention the $1155 they are bumping it up to. We’re sick of constantly being this close to dead broke and want to get out of debt and start building up a savings, maybe even - dare i say it? - invest!

The only solution we could see clearly would be to downsize. We’ve already lived in a studio apartment and we decided we simply can’t do it again. And Mom needs to cut her expenses too, so… it only made sense.

So far, even the search has gone *relatively* smoothly. Mom freaks out at every expense named and tries to figure out the logistics of paying for them when we haven’t even decided on a place. Justin wrinkles his nose at the lower-middle class areas and longingly looks at the nice, large complexes with sparkling pools and air-conditioned gyms. i, on the other hand, gimp along and try to notice if there’s a lot of noise and if there’s a dishwasher and central air.

No actual decision have been made; we’re still looking, still arguing over which amenities we prefer at what price. But just from the apartment hunt experience, i think we’ll all get along just fine. Who said you can’t go home again? You can at least make a new version of it.

It’s nearly 5 am and i haven’t slept a wink. In fact, i’m doing something i don’t often do.

i’m worrying.

Normally i’m the kind that will flout “Worry is not faith!” but my faith is being sorely tested. My employer has all but denied my Worker’s Compensation claim and they are doing all they can to make this drag on. i have had no income since 8 April and i am a majority (60% or so) of our income. As frosting on the bitter cake, i do not do well being told to sit and do nothing all day. It depresses me.

While my healing is slow but progressing, the paperwork and delays in Worker’s Comp payment has caused a lot of stress. It is only the help of family that has gotten us to this point in the month financially and now, to be quite frank, i don’t know how we’re going to pay rent next week, let alone the bills. Which brings me to my other worry: i’m 5 days into being out of Wellbutrin XL and only have another 5 day’s supply of Lexapro. So not only do we have to figure out how to buy food, gas, pay the bills (they are all due near the first few days of the month) and our *GASP* $1,105 rent check, but somehow we have to scrounge up another $220 or so to pay for my medications.

i don’t know how we’re going to do it.

To be clear, i know that i’m depressed right now. i’m fighting on a slippery slope. i’m depressed because i’m so sick of living paycheck to paycheck, of having to stretch every penny as far as it can go. i’m depressed because i have no income security and i’m sick of waiting the tables of people who treat me like a servant and third-class citizen. i’m depressed because the apartment is a disaster and my husband, while ever-loving, has never specialized in “neat and tidy”. i’m depressed because i’m in withdrawal from one anti-depressant and praying to GOD in Heaven that i will not be without them both. i’m depressed because i’m bored and scared and worried.

Yet i can do nothing to change any of this right now. Instead of worrying, i try to channel it and pray. i need His Providence shower upon me, upon us, so that we may stay afloat one more day, one more week, one more month…

The only hope that shines like the full moon through my darkness begins with Justin’s graduation next month. After 6 years, he will have completed his bachelor’s degree and will be progressing to a full-time position in his field of choice which will permit me to go back to school full-time in the fall. My hope is to complete my transfer needs in two years and then head to Brown University… my Providence in Rhode Island (remember how that became a fiasco?). All of this is better, so much better, than what i’m facing. Financial stability, medication stability, a chance to shine as an academic again.

i know that sometimes you can only cling to your hope to survive. Sometimes it truly is all you have. While i’m not foolish enough to think my life is currently so desperate as that, i am sure that “dire straights” is not much of an exaggeration. In response, i pray and i hope and i keep thinking about the wonderful day in which i will be out of California; free from serving, working on my degree, learning new things and meeting all kinds of new people.

Hope, sweet hope. May it last me long enough to get through this trial though it hasn’t through so many others.

Money makes things difficult.

i have managed to reduce our debt and am working on increasing our income by “closing” every shift i can. But now, how to keep track of all the income and expediture?

For three years i have used Microsoft Money. Convenient? Yes. Complicated? Sometimes. Randomly miscalculating my account balances after a few months? Oh, yes. A touch anal-retentive to calculate my net worth every day? DEFINITELY.

i like what Richard Jenkins had to say about budgeting:

I’ve kept a budget of one kind or another, first on paper and then with the help of various software programs, for about 20 years — despite a strong suspicion that I was wasting my time. The illusion of control, I argued to myself, was better than none at all.

My approach to budgeting was to carefully track my spending during the month and to adjust my budget targets up and down in each category, so that my total expenses never exceeded my income.

Useful? Sometimes. Anal-compulsive? Probably.

After two decades of this, though, I started to wonder if there isn’t an easier, more effective way to budget. I realized that the hardest part about keeping a budget is getting useful information from it. There’s too much detail and not enough bottom line.

(Emphasis mine)

So, in a brave attempt to KISS, i narrowed down the needs of my budget.

1. Be able to pay the rent and bills on time and in full.
2. Be able to pay our gasoline, groceries, various household necessities and “fun” in cash.
3. Save. One long-term (like a nest egg) and the other short-term (for prescriptions, planned car maintenance, car/renter’s insurance, etc.).
4. Have some money to have fun with!
5. STAY OUT OF THE RED!

i’d say that’s simple enough.

Enter problem one. As mentioned in Episode 3, most of my income comes to us in cash: nearly 90% in fact. How to control the cash flow and still have money in the checking account can be quite the quandry. In an attempt to make this easier, i’ve figured out what that if #2 is to be met, that means that - per month - we need $716 in cash, which is $167 a week. The rest of my tips would need to be deposited each week (about $193, hopefully more!).

Problem two: our banking. i’ve recently joined ING Direct’s Electric Orange. i actually was referred to the program through our Orange Savings account with them which yields a miraculous 4.5% APY as opposed to our credit union’s palsy 1.25% APY. What’s so fabulous is that the Electric Orange checking account also offers a 4% APY! All of our direct deposits are going there. The only downside is that they do not have normal ATM’s to accept cash deposits. So we’re keeping out credit union checking account for the sole purpose of deposits. Then we just transfer that into the Electric Orange account. A bit roundabout, i know, but goodness! 4% APY versus nothing! i’ll squeeze every penny i can out of each dollar i can, thank you.

To make this all incredibly simple, i designed some simple Excel checkbook ledgers: one for the “bank” of cash kept on hand, one for the credit union checking account and one for the Electric Orange account. At the end of every month, i save a copy of the statements to the computer, back it up, reconcile my ledgers to confirm everything went through as it should and - GASP! - erase it for clean slate with the new month! WOOHOO!

It’s simple, it doesn’t over-complicate things and let’s me focus on what’s more important. Like my husband, practicing the guitar, reading…

And my blog.