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Did You Pay For College?

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I recently read this discussion called: “Why Kids Should Chip in for College.” It is a discussion I support. I had to pay my way through college and while it was tough, it was good life experience for me. It starts the reality that life costs money in a big way. Maybe you do not have to have your child pay for school completely, but they should contribute. If not, what happens when they graduate? Will you continue to pay for their life? How have you helped them to prepare for the next stage of their life where they have to pay rent, utilities, food, car payments, insurance, etc.?

These days with the zillions of technical devices we have at our finger tips, the ease of access to credit cards, and dwindling checking accounts, those graduating from college will have a harder time balancing the cost of their wants with the bills they will now have to pay, with the amount in their paychecks. Do we need to shift the balance of what we are doing for kids today? Have we taught them the value of the cost of life itself?

I remember a class we had to take in high school. I cannot remember what it was called, but what I do recall is that we had a section on stocks. We were split up into teams and we had to decide what stocks we were going to buy together based on the research we did on the company, the rate of return, and many other factors. I cannot remember how well my team did, but it sparked a new thrill inside me of something I had never been exposed to – investing. What I find interesting about this class that we were required to take, was that we never learned about the basics of money: balancing a checkbook, living within your means, interest rates, deciding between how much you can make saving versus paying off debt, and saving for retirement. These aspects of personal finance would have benefitted us way before we were ever at a place to actually invest in stocks.

I wonder how many college graduates know those core personal finances ideas. Are most college graduates savvy with their social media profiles, and maybe how to create their next app, but not ready for the basics of paying their rent, and saving for their next plane ticket? Are we coddling kids today, rather than finding ways for them to be set up for success?

What do you think? Are we preparing today’s college graduates for their best financial future?

Any.do is it for you?

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My new favorite app: Any.do. Thank you to a colleague that share this app with me! Yes, I am a dork and love the app that keeps me organized. At the moment I have two apps that keep me organized. The one I have had longer is Wunderlist. I use it for those long-term lists. For example: I keep a list of restaurants we want to venture to at some point. When I learn of a new one, or receive a recommendation for one, I add it to my Wunderlist Restaurant list. I have another list for movies I want to see, and television shoes I want to catch up on.

For the day-to-day items I use Any.do to keep me on track. Here are a few reasons why I love Any.do:

  • I can schedule reminders to pop-up on my phone and remind me that I need to complete the task.
  • Any.do syncs with my iPhone calendar. If I turn the phone into landscape mode, I can see my tasks connected with my calendar.
  • I can make a note to call someone with Any.do and then when it is time to make my call, I can call right within Any.do.
  • If I would like to add something to my to-do list in Any.do, I can speak my to-do item via the “audio” function on their to-do list.
  • At 10 a.m. each morning I get a notification on my iPhone that it is time to plan my day. A nice reminder to think about what needs to be done.
  • I can move to-do items to a later day just by dragging the item.
  • Chris and I can share an account, so I can add items to the list specific for Chris when he opens the app on his iPhone (and vice versa for me).
  • There is an extension for Chrome, so you can use it on your computer and iPhone (I have yet to use the Chrome functionality yet).

Both Any.do and Wunderlist keep me organized in different ways. What iPhone apps do you use to keep you organized? #keepmeposted 

Do you want to feel truly connected with others?

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Do you ever have a conversation with someone only to realize they are in another world? Their mind is thinking about Facebook, the text they just received, the email they need to respond to? We are now such a highly connected society that we often do not go more than an hour without having connected with someone that is miles away from us, yet we struggle to sometimes connect with the person that is sitting right in front of us.

A few months ago I finished reading the book: “Program or be Programmed” by Douglas Rushkoff. A few days ago, I was reminded of Rushkoff’s book, after an interaction that just felt too on the surface to me. We have become a society that just takes from the top layer. We are getting farther and farther away from going deep. Our world revolves around the moment by moment distractions of our phones, tablets, and what is happening on the Internet. Rushkoff says:

“A society that looked at the Internet as a path toward highly articulated connections and new methods of creating meaning is instead finding itself disconnected, denied deep thinking, and drained of enduring values.”

My question is what can we do to get back to deeper values, connected conversations, and quality interactions? I also like what he says here:

“Faced with a networked future that seems to favor the distracted over the focused, the automatic over the considered, and the contrary over the compassionate, it’s time to press the pause button and ask what all this means to the future of our work, our lives, and even our species.”

I want to take another look at my moments and interactions and see how I act. I already know that I am a multi-tasker. I at times applaud myself for all that I can do at once. But, am I doing things better? Am I really focused on all that is happening around me? Could I provide more quality to whatever activity that I am doing by being completely 100% connected and aware?

What do you think?

Dad was a classy mooner

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In case you were wondering, the title of this post is sarcastic. My father was far from classy. He was real and raw. What you saw is what you got. He did not hide things. If he was mad you knew it. If he was emotional you knew it. If he was happy, or thought something was funny, you could see it on his face, or in the way his body shook with laughter. Yet, from what I could remember he still had a poker face.

Other than being in the Air Force for a few years, and stationed in Turkey, he lived a good chunk of his life in Indiana. Now Indiana, for those of you living there, I am not knocking you, but well my dad did not always mind his manners. Indiana did not bring out the classiness in my dad. One of the things I remember (and yes I was mortified at the time) was that when he was pissed off at someone for cutting him off in the car, he had a sign between his seats that was on a stick with someone mooning you. When he was ticked off, he would pull it out and moon the other car. At the time I was mortified if I was ever in his truck with him, now I look back and think, “What the heck, at least he told them what he thought.” Do you ever wish you had one of those signs?

A few weeks ago I finished the book: “Too Good to Be True” by Benjamin Anastas. He writes about how his father would moon people in public. This is an excerpt from his book:

“My father is about to moon someone. In the A&P parking lot. I should pause for a moment and explain, from the safety of adulthood, that my father had three major styles when it came to mooning. The first and probably the most common type happened in the car, when my father was behind the wheel. Let’s call it the Face in the Window. If we were driving through Gloucester and passed a friend from his wilder, artsy crowd, he would sometimes put the car in neutral, crouch up on the seat, yank down his pants, and press his bare ass to the glass. Sometimes he did the same thing when the car was parked, but that version had a lower degree of difficulty. I had seen the Face in the Window from the outside enough times to fear it: the twin mounds of flesh pressed hard against the window; the dark crevice down the center, like a crack in the earth; the beard of public hair and dangling ball sack. No one, no matter what his suit of character armor, should have to contemplate the furry pucker of his father’s asshole in the window of a car, or anywhere else. It leads to nightmares. It is like seeing your own death. Actually, it’s like seeing your own death and staring at your father’s asshole at the same time.

His second style of mooning was an offshoot of the first: the Breezeway. This is identical to the Face in the Window, except the car windows are open. It’s fresher, more natural. Easier to shrug off, if you happen to catch some collateral.

The third style of mooning is the easiest to employ on the fly: the Quick Drop. This is the moon my father used when he was on foot. It could happen in an instant, at any time. He dropped his pants, threw himself forward, and reached behind to spread his ass checks wide. Without the spread it was still a full-on mooning, but the effect was a little more restrained, more polite.” Page 96-97

So I guess my dad was not alone. There were other mooners out there. I wonder how many are still out there, as I have yet to be mooned. If I ever am, I know that it might be a classy take on Face in the Window, the Breezeway, the Quick Drop, or my dad’s version with a butt on a sign. Whichever version, I know it will bring a smile to my face.

Thank you, Dad, for keeping it real.

How do you make your money decisions?

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Do you talk with your spouse about money? I do, but I know it is not necessarily the norm. I am what you might call a money freak. Even so, I have relaxed over the past year. I am maybe now more of just a fiend rather than a freak. Growing up without many things has made me keenly aware of where I spend my money, and yet, that only matters if Chris and I are on the same page about money.

We were not always on the same page. It is something that has evolved over time. The evolution has happened because we talk. We talk about most purchases. Some of you might say that is a bit over the top, and yes it might be. Regardless of whether it is extreme, it works for us. There is no ill will about what either of us has purchased because we both agreed on it before dropping the credit card. You might ask, “Do you talk about every single purchase?” The answer is no. For the most part we do not talk about the normal everyday purchase, like grocery items, but we do talk about most purchases over $100. It means there is no resentment, and it is easy. It is as simple as sending each other a text if we want to make a larger purchase. If the other is not sure, we wait until we can have a regular conversation.

Why does it work? It works because we have a few rules, and it is grounded on a sense of respect for the other individual and their opinion. We have shared finances, so we believe that we have a shared stake in the decisions on how we spend that shared money. One of the first rules we have is that we do not spend outside our means. If we cannot afford it, we do not make the purchase. It would have to be an emergency for us to spend outside our means. I strongly believe that if you buy only what you can afford, you will have a lot less stress in your life, and if you take that stand you will feel more like you, then living outside of who you are. The result of living within what we can afford, means not living off of our credit cards. Whatever we charge must be paid in full when the bill arrives. It feels more honest and true to who we are, when you can actually pay for your purchase.

This is what works for us. It is in no way a judgement for how others make their money decisions. I found this older LearnVest post about how a couple handles their money decisions. I liked this line:

“Because of our open running dialogue about our finances, we never argue about money, unlike most couples.”

It is true. Honesty with open communication means little to no arguments about money. It does not mean that the conversations are always easy, but it does mean you are connected about how you want to live your life, spend your money, and engage in the world together.

What works for you?

*UPDATE* Wow. I am in a bit of shock. In full transparency, everything I just wrote about apparently happens only 99% of the time. In the time it took me to write this post, my husband strayed from our agreed-upon protocol for the first time in over 10 years and made a large purchase without discussing the final details together first. Although the purchase was made with the best of intentions, he knew better and got an earful from me. No, not because I’m a hard-ass and felt the urge to raise my voice, but because he should have had a simple, open dialogue about it first, come to an agreement, and then dropped the cash. #stilllearningtogether #patienceplease