Assessing a Slow Summer (and Fall)

With my calculator app on my iPhone, I ran and re-ran the numbers. Then I cross-checked those numbers with the numbers on my work computer’s calculator. I must have done this four or five times, along with running the numbers in my head. No matter what I did, the iPhone, the computer, and my head, all told me that I couldn’t afford Vegas and Dewey Beach back-to-back. I know I’m not great with numbers, so I decided to run them one final time. The outcome was the same: no dice. The numbers told me that I had no choice. I simply could not do what I wanted to do. Finally accepting what technology confirmed, I sighed, and clicked over to VK’s gchat window. It was time to make the call.

“Fuck it. Let’s do this,” I said.

“YES!” VK wrote back.

I really can’t afford it, but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, I thought.

It would take me the entire summer to finally cross that bridge. And the fall.

How bad was the hole that I put myself? Let’s just say that those two weeks I spent partying with VK and GMAC ruined my summer. When we came back, I told myself that I’d hide in my apartment until I dug back out from my debt hole. It was a pretty good plan, except that sometimes, life just happens. You have to pay for the unexpected. Bills and taxes start piling up. Digging out requires you to temporarily dig farther down. And then, sometimes, usually, I’m my own worst enemy.

Just when I think I’m getting back to where I need to be, July 4th arrives. It’s a three day weekend, in the middle of summer. The sun is out. The pools are open. The tourists are in town. What was I supposed to do? Sit at save at home? Is that what you would have done? Don’t lie to yourself. Of course you would have partied all weekend. And that’s what I did.

But that wasn’t the real reason why I’m usually my own worst enemy. The problem was, I got paid that weekend, and I was determined to blow my entire paycheck. It was a fully deliberated conscious decision. Bars, clubs, pool parties, drinking, more bars. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Monday night I stayed out dolo, until the end of the night, spitting game. Whatever the cost, I didn’t care. That weekend culminated into the single worst mistake of the summer. I didn’t check my bank account for days, not wanting to face the truth.

This type of all-out irresponsibility for me was unprecedented. I had never been so reckless with my cash. A few years ago I was picking pennies off the streets and throwing them in the stock market, buying foreign oil companies and basking in the dividends while regular folks complained about gas prices. Now? I was sitting at home, drinking alone, wondering when they would cut the lights back on.

How did I let myself get to that point? Well, for the past few years, I simply charged everything to Sallie Mae. Hey, when you’re going to grad school with massive amounts of school loans, what’s another thousand? Three? Ten? I knew I’d be working again and getting paid once school was over.

Except that that didn’t happen. The job that I had lined up fell through around graduation time. I hoped that I would find something else soon, but I had a feeling that it would be a while. Of course I’d spend my waking hours pondering over my future. Would I have to move back home, in shame? Live with Mom and Dad? In a smaller town where there’s not too much to do? Go home as a complete failure? The magic eight ball said “signs point to yes.” I had to drastically scale back my plans that summer. It was depressing. Not even foreign travel would cheer me up. Instead, the problems compounded.

Over the course of those eight months of unemployment, I had pent up demand for blowing money fast. Drinks, clothes, travel, dates, everything that I was missing out on, boiled inside me. By the time I started working, and decided to travel again with VK and GMAC, I knew I wasn’t going to hold back. I could have said “no,” but sometimes you need to scream. This was my way of screaming. We all know that it’s only a temporary solution, but it feels good in the moment. No matter how fleeting, sometimes you just do it.

Regardless of the situation, every other weekend or so I just had to go out, whether it was a cheap or free happy hour on hump day, or one Saturday night just to see what I was missing. These nights didn’t help. I found myself drinking more than usual. The combination of rock-bottom prices, and fatties and fuglos, created a situation where I’d keep blowing money just to make it better. The next morning, I was surprised at how much I spent. But I think all of this worked out for me, because I started thinking about what I was doing, and what I needed to do. I needed to be better with my money, obviously, but I also knew that I needed to put myself in better situations to meet women. The cheap happy hours didn’t attract what I was looking for. Instead of cute girls interested in meeting someone, I found large groups of friends and co-workers, fat chicks and average girls. I needed better venues. I needed to focus on day game. I’d reserve the bars for Sundays, when I could also watch the games. It’s not like it would have been a waste of time. Friday nights would be a great time for chores and writing. Without being tired and hungover, Saturdays would be used for more writing and day game. Saturday nights? Maybe I’d go out, maybe not. Sundays I’d watch the games where the girls would be at. During the week, I’d go to the coffee shop after work and polish off some of my writing. Other nights I’d work on a foreign language and other self improvement activities. I’d spend some money on upgrading my wardrobe.

I came to that realization around August. The plan was to be out of the hole by the middle of September. I would focus more time on day game. I would begin to write. And as usual, none of that went according to plan. I was getting out of the hole, but I found FemFan taking up my weekends. Work demanded more hours. By the time the weekend rolled around, I would lack the drive to do much of anything. It would take me a little longer that I had anticipated to get back in the swing of things. And just as I was being more responsible, it was time to blow two paychecks worth in Miami.

During this time when I was supposed to be organizing my life, the wild weekends were padded by weeks of kicking myself for being so reckless. I couldn’t concentrate on much besides finding ways of financing what I wanted right then and there. I had no idea how much mental energy I was wasting until I was out talking with some girl and she asked me about my hobbies. It wasn’t a question that I had gotten often, but what stumped me was the realization that I had stopped doing everything. Reading, writing, learning, everything, was stopped. I was at a loss for words not so much because I had no truthful response, but because I was dissappointed in myself for letting it get to that point, and not actually realizing it until that moment.

The craziest thing about my situation was within one year, I went from being unemployed and depressed, to being paid more than ever and depressed. In August I moved up from a job that was just barely paying the bills to one with plenty of spare change. And I was getting regular tail. But I had gotten away from taking care of basic things, and everything suffered. Finances, hobbies, even my game, all slipped. I even stopped reading books.

I concluded that I just hadn’t adjusted to life after gradschool. The Sallie Mae security blanket was gone, and, shockingly, I had to start paying her back. Working meant I had to wake up early, so I couldn’t go out on week nights like I had been doing and function properly in my cubicle. With no more classses, I couldn’t ignore professors and blog while in class. No longer could I work out in the early afternoon, take a nap and watch some TV, and then start writing and hit the bars. I was back in the real world, and I didn’t adjust. The only things that helped me cope were bags of well fitting clothes and bottles of cheap vodka.

This was definitely a lost summer and fall for me. A colossal waste of time and resources. But it was a time I spent finding myself learning experience that I will use going forward. It’s about time to be responsible and use my time wisely. And hit on girls. It’s about time that I return.