Fadedwords

So.  Today was a friend’s daughter’s birthday.  I also needed to get my oil changed.  I took care of all of that, and had a great time at the party.  Then my friend BC asked if I wanted to go see Nights in Rodanthe, which I did.  We went to her apartment and found a showtime, went and got dinner, and I got a fairly inexpensive Halloween costume.  The movie was fabulous (bring many tissues if you’re going to see it), and then I came home.

I got on line to check my bank account, because I knew it’d be a little low.  I was somewhat surprised to see $0.00 as my checking account balance.

Apparently Sch*0lastic did not charge my debit card immediately when I paid for two books I bought at the book fair.  Instead of charging immediately, which 99.999% of companies do, they charged my card today.  So I had been budgeting under the impression that I had already spent that money, and I had not been charged yet.  So that money came out today.

I’ve had to transfer $100 from savings to cover me “just in case” until pay day, which is Tuesday.  But I’ve also had to come to a very difficult decision.

I’m going to have to give up horseback riding.  The past two months trying to save for lessons have been terrible.  By the end of the month I’m in panic mode because I don’t have any money left.  As much as I love riding and hate the thought of not doing it, it’s not responsible to do it.  I should be paying my bills, helping Jake with major household stuff, taking care of Merlin, and saving whatever is left over after that.  Right now my bills are being paid, albeit not all of them on time every month (my student loan payment is due the 28th of the month, and sometimes I don’t get paid til the 28th of the month).  I help Jake with what I can, but anything beyond basic bills is something I can’t help with… and sometimes even the basics don’t work.  And poor Merlin has had something eating at his skin for the past few weeks, and I cannot afford to take him to the vet to get it checked out.  I’m barely putting anything into savings, and the past two months I have been withdrawing from savings to cover checking.

It’s just not working.

So maybe in another year or so when I have my credit card debt paid down and my one student loan closer to paid off I can look at this again.  Right now it’s just not working.  I’m sick of living like this, and the only thing that is expendable in my budget is riding.

I don’t even know what their refund policy is… it’s quite possible (and likely) that I will be told that they don’t do refunds.  We’ll see on that.  I’ll be emailing the director of the academy to ask.

Today is a day that I wish I had gone to a state school, never gotten a credit card, or gotten a job that paid me enough to pay my bills easily.  None of those things is the case, so I have to give up the one thing I love more than anything else to be an adult.

Being an adult sucks.