My Wife Went To College, And All I Got Was 50K In Debt!

My husband is a good man. He takes good care of me. I am not hard to take care of though, I don't smoke (unless I do what the Parenting magazine's tell me and then I am smokin' in bed) I don't drink (at least not right now at this very moment) and I don't do drugs (unless you count the happy gas the dentist gave me as a child-I would stop brushing just to get a cavity to merit a ride on the Dentist's chair of flying high). I stay home, raise our children, keep the house, balance the checkbook, make the meals, do the grocery shopping, wash all dirty clothes, bathe the dog, put gas in the van and I even will mow the yard on occasion just to surprise him when he comes home. I am a pretty good catch. I don't shop excessively-honestly. I do not even enjoy shopping really because I prefer my money to stay in the checkbook that I balance. I have not pulled out a credit card in over 5 years... I don't see the point of them, AND, I let him have most of the control of the remote! He is a lucky lucky man.

The only negative point is my college debt. I do not have my own income. This job that I have does not pay all that much, and we cannot live off of the ad revenues that this blog collects (last month I earned a total of $0.01!) So my debt is being paid by my husband. I hate that thought-I really do but... it is partly HIS fault that I have this debt. Let me explain~

I met my husband when I was fresh out of high school and working for the summer at a restaurant and lounge in our hometown. The restaurant was very nice, the lounge was very "not nice." The place was owned by a Greek named Tony who wore his button down shirts half open with his chest hair popping out and gold chains around his neck. He was greasy-he was an "oily bohunk" but leave out the bohunk part. He was about 4'9'' and he thought he was God's gift to women. Between him, the cooks in the back and the bartenders, my guardian angel was working overtime that summer.

My husband and his twin brother started frequenting the lounge. Why you ask? Well, they didn't fit the normal cast of players at the bar-the high school teacher who was there every day grading summer school papers, the group of older women with frizzed and teased hair and blue eye shadow, or the leather vested biker guys that came in on Thursdays-my husband and his brother did not fit in at all! They came to listen to the Talking Head's cover band (who did a great rendition of "And She Was")... or at least that is what I assumed. Maybe they came in because in our hometown, there was not much to do unless you wanted to cruise up and down the Boulevard and park at the Burger King or the Dairy Queen and drink Boones' Farm Strawberry Hill Wine in your backseat. Maybe they could get cheap beer and watered down Rum and Cokes there, or maybe they just thought they were too sophisticated for Burger King but too poor to drive downtown Chicago. I don't know, all I do know is that I instantly noticed them from my hostess-with-the-mostest station.

One night they came in with a girl I knew. When she walked past me to go to the restroom I said "Hey Suzie, which one you got, because I'll take the other!" Well, the other was my future husband, my future debt payer.

We started dating. Now, it should be said that I was only 18 and my husband was 23 at the time. 18 and 23!!! What were my parents thinking??? I mean, if my daughter came home and said that she had met a guy at a lounge who was 23 and she really liked him and wanted to date him... I would lock her away in her room and make her say the rosary over and over. I guess there was some divine intervention happening here-either that or my parents didn't think he would be hanging out long because I never kept a boyfriend long. I was too free... too ready to see what the world had in store for me to be tied down to a boy. Oh my poor parents.

August came and I headed away to a small Catholic (read: enormous tuition) college in Southern Indiana, and my husband headed back to University in Arizona. (He had enlisted in the Army right out of high school and after 4 years decided to go to school. So while I was taking Geometry class and planning homecoming, he was carrying a machine gun and wearing camouflage in field exercises. We had a lot in common). We vowed to stay in our relationship and to try it out long distance.

That worked for 18 months and by Christmas break of my Sophomore year, my husband dressed up at Santa and placed a ring on my finger. I was 19 and he was 24... HOLY COW! My poor parents.

I quit school because how could I possibly be separated from the man I loved and moved out to Arizona to be close to him and to plan our life together. Again, my poor parents. We were married when I was 21 and he was 25... we were babies-but we were a match!

Years passed and we had two children. My husband was working on his Master's degree when I got the notion to go back and finish my college education. It was all fine and dandy until I was a semester or two in and realized that it was really hard to care for a family and go to school-so I wanted to quit. I figured I was doing fine without a degree... I mean, I was a mom, not a lawyer-I was happy with that. My husband would not hear of it. He was my cheerleader throughout and I finally FINALLY graduated. I now have a piece of paper that is worth $50,000! My husband HATES when I say that.

Anyway, we have been happily saving money and paying off this loan with no bumps and no set-backs until recently. We have met up with just about the dumbest bank in the free world and this post is too long today to go into it, so I will continue with Part II of this exciting tale of adventure, intrigue, romance and pitfalls tomorrow. Be sure to tune in as I will be examining the mind of a senior citizen banker who should have retired in 1984 and the crazy cost of Private Education! It is sure to be a page-turner~