Diary of a Low Budget Superhero

"Why do you do this?"

A simple enough question. Why it made me tearful? That part isn't so simple. This is a bout between me and my own whiny self pity, so if you're not in the mood or are sick of people griping about the economy, move along, nothin' to see here.

So, this was yesterday, and "why do you do this" was my Joe asking me why do I insist on looking at real estate online when I know perfectly well that we can't buy anything, not now, and not in a future visible to anyone without rose-colored glasses? See, I've been looking at ZipRealty and Trulia for...well, a few years at this point. I pore over the price reductions, the number of days on the market, the calculated down payment amount if you have three percent, if you have ten, the amount you would need on hand for closing costs...

The reason he asked me this question just at that moment was by way of response to what I had just said to him, a bitchy statement bitten off like a chunk of ice, put in the form of a question, accompanied by me pointing dramatically out the window, across the street, to the condo units whose windows face our own, Commonwealth Avenue and the B line train between us.

"$528,000 for one of those places. Can you believe it. Can you believe over half a million." I correct myself: Commonwealth Avenue and the B line train and a phenomenal, monumental lifestyle gap between us.

"Why do you do this?"

"Why shouldn't I? I need to know what's out there." The knowledge I have amassed since 2007, about square footage and roofs and vinyl siding and furnaces and taxes, I could write a book. A depressing book. 2007 was, by the way, when those half mil condo units were built. We saw them go up. Nicely enough appointed, but nothing spectacular, and anyway, situated above a pretty loud sports bar and pizza place that's open 'til 3am, with a convenience mart on the corner. There is no parking. While they were constructing them, they hung a banner touting the "coming soon" and it read $750K. We wondered who they thought lived in this neighborhood? The fact that half of the units remain empty might answer that question: nobody lives here who can afford this property. This is a neighborhood of students, young professionals and middle class folks, plenty of working class and laborers and new residents, mostly from Russia and Haiti. $750K? This is upper Allston, not Newbury Street. "$528,000 is their ROCK BOTTOM," I added.

I just wanted Joe to share my outrage at this, further evidence that we're priced out here. We can either become country mice (or at least suburb mice) who own, or remain city rats who rent.

Still seated before my laptop, I clicked over to a property I had found. Not here in Boston, but in New Jersey, in the town where his parents live. I read aloud the listing, pausing to make note that this is a townhouse twice the size and less than half the price of those units across the street, and about five times the size of our apartment. 2279 square feet. The mere thought of all that open space made me choke up a little. High ceilings. Two car underground garage, grill range with a conventional AND a convection oven. Two refrigerators. Hardwood floors. Granite counter tops. Recessed lighting and skylights, All stainless appliances, a wood burning fireplace, a huge patio, finished basement, tons of storage, walk in closets, a master bath with steam shower and jacuzzi tub. Air conditioning! And $235K. Not that we're moving to New Jersey, it's just one of the things that could happen in the world. Taxes are high, but then, I'm living in Taxachusetts right now, so...

"Why do you do this? It makes you sad and cranky. We're fine, we have each other."

"I know it makes me sad and cranky. But Joe, I don't know what we're doing. We're stuck."

I do feel stuck sometimes. Stuck in a tiny apartment with a fridge shorter than I am and a single external (windowed) wall. That's where the tearful part comes in; he's right, we ARE fine, and we love each other more than any two people can possibly dare to dream. I told you this entry was a bout between me and my own self pity. We're healthy, we're frugal, we have no considerable debt left. Just a student loan at this point. Trying to save, but it's going sooo slooooow. At these times, blowing my nose and dabbing my wet cheeks, I try to remind myself there was a time when "saving" was a laugh, when it wasn't just a grumble about how bills are taking away all my money, but a dark, wolf at the door feeling of gravity because there WAS no money there to give up to bills. It's been many years since I've literally wondered where my next income was coming from and whether or not I could survive on Ramen and Wonder Bread.

Yes, I'm saving. I have been working numbers lately trying to figure how how long I have to save, and at what rate, before there's enough in there to even consider a car? Because, oh yes, I would need a car first in order to even think about buying a home, because clearly "in the city" is just not going to happen. I'm gonna end up in a nice home, but if you asked me to bet on the odds of an easy commute via public transportation...? No bet.

(And then what do I do with Joe, who doesn't even want to learn to drive?)

I just can't help it, every now and then I get into these sad sack modes where I NEED MORE SPACE. For example, I was so happy to get a KitchenAid for Christmas, I actually wept. But every time I have to move two things to get it on the counter to use, I get into the sad mode. Whenever we do laundry and it's a clothes hurricane in here, I get into the mode. My friends come over and have to crowd onto my small "apartment size" Bob's Furniture couch, and despite the happiness brought by my friends, I get into the mode. Whenever I get on hands and knees to sponge the winter sludge from the doorway area, I get into the mode. My kingdom for some kind of foyer or entry space that a person enters first, before the living room proper, so that winter's salty wet muck isn't a moat I must leap in order to enter my bathroom.

I satisfy such occasional self-pity by talking to myself like I'm a bratty child. "Listen, Veruca Salt," my logic brain has to tell my inner whiner, "You have regular eggs, nobody needs a golden goose, you little snot. There's people with no eggs at all, they'd kill for your regular eggs, now shut up and go to work or you'll really be eggless." I kind of suck it up to stay happy. I AM happy. But now and then I get back on Trulia or ZipRealty and ask "Why not me?"

In October when I went to visit my old childhood girlfriends, I had this same talk with one of my best friends in life, my soul sister when we were twelve. A lot like me she is, we even have similarly-minded men we've settled down with, and she's a gal whose finances meant she had move back in with her mom, with husband and kid in tow. It's symbiotic, her mom needed the help, too. So she's back in her girlhood bedroom where we used to have sleepovers gazing up at Duran Duran and Rick Springfield posters, read Stephen King aloud to freak each other out and record elaborate talk shows into her tape recorder. I commiserated with her about the impossibility of this economy, saying "I just don't know how people are doing it."

How are people doing it? How do people have weddings and vacations and kids and dogs and cars and a house?

Right now we're living comfortably, but that is only because we live simply: we never take a vacation to anywhere, we have so far skirted the car payment and upkeep, we shop using coupons and avoid extras such as big cable TV packages and any product that starts with a "i"...

I keep saying that getting just a LITTLE ahead would be great. I don't even want a million dollars. My whole life would change for like $15k or $20K right now.

"Why do you do this?"

Maybe it's just a matter of keeping my eyes on the prize, to remember why I work so hard and to have all the necessary knowledge when I finally get there. You have to constantly think of ways to pare down and keep more money. Already, a day later, I put a bunch of my books up for sale on Half.com, and tomorrow I'm going to kill the MCI long distance, we don't need it. Save, save, save.

Eye of the tiger.

Ding ding.

I see you over there in the menu bar, Weight Watcher's tab, don't get all lonely because I haven't touched you since summer. I got stuff for you too, I just haven't felt like writing. And you know those Facebook statuses? They've been taking the place of Low Budget Superhero. Almost a decade of writing, and it's coming undone because I can now post my thoughts in 220 character micro-blogs throughout the day and night, getting immediate and satisfying comments from every other obsessive Live Feed button-pusher. You know who you are! I have no legitimate claims to outrage, having been the cheerleader whose rallying whoops enticed at least five people to join. If you're tweeting because of me, I'm sorry.

I do need to write up the essay about that October trip. I just need like a, I don't know, a decompression? Like a couple of weeks off with no TV and no Facebook. So that I can write about Facebook and how it's blurring the normally linear timeline of our weird little lives. Come on, your old boyfriend commenting along with your best friend from fifth grade and your new boyfriend's mom is just...well, you'd never find all those people in the same room. Worlds colliding, rainbows connecting.

You'll notice there's no longer any commenting available HERE. This I changed so that I could control a spammer problem I was having, but I think I'll keep it comment'less for awhile. The people I would want to hear from, you know how to reach me if it's so important. And there's always the Facebook comment, because you know I'll be posting this to my profile...what a brave new world we live in, hm?

So much going on, so much. Let's see, well, the earthquake in Haiti is the worst thing I've seen in my lifetime. Here at home, the nation's economy is in the toilet. Last night was the State of the Union address, and while I'm still an Obama Mama, I just feel like it was too much salesy talk, finger pointing, platitudes and "in a perfect world" promises. OH, and too much applause by the Dems for what really amounted to a pep rally! Anyone else annoyed by that? When did that start, the constant applause during the SOTU? I don't recall that from when I was a kid. I don't know what any of the answers are, I just know things need to change. That's what drove the commonwealth, which was rocked by the Scott Brown win last week. Because nobody knows what to think past "what the f....?"

Joe's still not working. While I must say I like that he's picked up this new hobby of cooking, I would also like to, oh, maybe buy a house? Or at least a condo? My credit is only in the high six hundreds and my savings is like two or three paychecks' away from not-existing. Realistically, we need both incomes and his superior credit if we're ever going to move out of this tiny apartment. It's hard to believe October was a whole entire calendar year since he was laid off. I'd just made an appointment with a Realtor to look at some condo's, and by the time the appointment day came around, he was out of work. Thanks, Universe, yer hilarious. That was a good one.

Joe has become quite the cook, though. Last Thanksgiving, I mean 2008, he watched me taking down a raw butternut squash and turning it into a delightful soup and, when he turned out to love the soup, acted like I'd just leaped a tall building in a single bound. By THIS Thanksgiving, he had experimented with a number of different variations on butternut squash soup (with apple, with leeks) and made a big pot to take over to his sister's house. Leeks? A mere few months ago he had to call me from the grocery store with list in hand.

"Which ones are leeks?"

"They're with the swiss chard and kale." That didn't help at all. I suspect he thought "swiss chard" and "kale" were some kind of fish.

"They look like scallions, but bigger and fatter...scallions look like leeks' mini-me."

Now he's expertly washing leeks ("That's not easy, baby!" "I know, I found a video online!"), crisping them and using them to top his culinary creations. It just proves that old adage about the clouds and the silver lining. "Oh, 2009? Yes, Joe didn't have a job for one single day of it, but on the plus side, he learned to make a perfect pie crust...from SCRATCH." We may have limped along on one income, but holy moly...fresh pie!

Actually, it's overstating to say we're "limping along." We're fine. We can live perfectly fine on one income. For one thing, they just keep extending the unemployment bennies, though we won't discuss how much of that goes straight into paying for health care. For another, we don't have any of life's luxur...I mean money pits. No house, so no lawn to care for or snow to remove, there's no repair bills for big appliances because we own no big appliances. No property taxes, heat is part of our rent. No car, so no insurance or gas or repairs. No pets, so no food or vet bills. No kids. When I think about it all, you know what? I don't know how people are doing it. Even just adding a car right now would change our whole financial picture. And I have decent income!

How are people doing it?!

Are they living on credit? We only got credit cards because, last year, our mortgage adviser dude said we both lack revolving debt, which hurts our credit for home loans. Meaning: you guys actually SAVE UP for what you want to buy? Oh, that won't do, you need to fling credit cards all around so we can see that you...have...credit?

I am sorry, I still just do NOT get the whole credit dance. It's retarded, and yes I know that's un-PC language, and since I'm already offending your delicate nature, it's motherfucking retarded. If you're frugal, non-extravagant, careful to live within your means with habits such as saving up for the big ticket purchases and only buying them when you have the money, it's the same thing as being a deadbeat loser. Really? REALLY? Credit score what? It is my belief that CREDIT SCORE should only be the jumping-off place, not the be-all and end-all factor that spells out a person's entire financial story. There's so much more to define a person's financial responsibility than just that score. I care about being careful with money, that's all. Score THIS, hosers. Makes me want to live somewhere where I can give you a chicken and a goat in trade for a hut.

People are angry. I'm angry. There's going to be a lot more flag-waving in 2010. What's your flag going to say on it?

One of my co-workers...FORMER co-workers...made his own stimulus package. Sticky Fingers decided to sneak out with about twenty grand worth of electronic parts. Can you even imagine? It's a pretty good story too, but I'll save that for another day.

Al ist klar, der kommisar.

Forgive the badly-barely-punned title, it's too nice a day and too gloriously lazy to come up with anything clever!

I'm poolside at Joe's parents' place in New Jersey, it's a gorgeous afternoon. And this is the actual "first taste of summer" we've yet had.

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