Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 236 Editor's Choice: 17
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There are some Real Assholes here
[Read the article: My delinquent student loans are driving me crazy]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Number one, the chances are good that the loans were from private lenders, not tax dollars.
Number two, this is one of the few countries in the entire frickin' WORLD where an intelligent, hardworking person has to PAY for a college education. In most of the civilized world, if you pass the test and want to go to college, it's paid by the gov't that understands that a highly educated populace is one of the protections for the future of the society.
Number three, JESUS, leave her alone. She's not saying: I don't want to pay it and never intend to do so. She's saying: WHY do I keep avoiding paying it when I know that it's a danger to me and my family?
Here's my suggestion: don't even talk to the collection people.
Go to whoever/whatever institution originated the loans in the first place. In person, if possible. Tell them that you have outstanding student loans, and that you want to pay them, but you are concerned about the effect on your family and your credit rating. Find out if they will consolidate at a lower rate than is current, and drop X amount of the back interest.
Then set a payment plan that you can and WILL keep to, and make it as unemotional as possible: like paying the mortgage or the utility bills: just another bill, each month.
Finally, take the advice of all who suggested that you get some help for the detritus of your childhood. I was not a child of alcoholics, but was married to one for 15 years. The help I got at Al Anon was equal to, if not greater than, that which I got at any therapy I ever received. Sitting in a room with people who have ALSO been there and done is priceless.
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Susie is NOT the LW
[Read the article: My delinquent student loans are driving me crazy]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]A single mom, taking out student loans while working fulltime is not a spoiled little brat charging pizza on a credit card.
Jesus.
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Give it Up, LW, YOU WERE A JERK
[Read the article: Her sexy T-shirt says "Kitty Not Happy" -- is that OK at work?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]This, I love: The events described are 100% true.
Maybe it's a throwback to my days as a philosophy undergrad, or just the realities of raising four children. But I promise you that TRUE is a meaningless word. FACTUAL, yes, that is the black and white of any given situation. TRUE means "This is how I interpreted the facts, given my own belief system."
And yours, I must say, is a doozy of a belief system. Are stupid teeshirts not appropriate in the workplace? Well, I work at home, and have been known to work in my jammies. But when I DID work in an office, the work attire ran the gamut of suits and ties for the big shots upstairs to Megadeath teeshirts for the mail clerks. Was I thrilled with the clothing choices of all my coworkers? Lordy, no! I remember R, a man with a growing belly, who for some reason believed that wide horizonal stripes, as in rugby shirts, were a good fashion choice. OH! the humanity.
But assuming a specific, very sexual meaning to a silly slogan--when I saw the headline for the column, I assumed, like many here, that "Kitty" was Hello Kitty or just the idea that she thought of herself as a cat, sleek and regal--that assumption is creepy, not at all defensible.
You may be old enough to be her father, but you have a lot of growing up to do. All that authoritarian crap, along with sexualizing EVERY. DAMNED. THING puts your emotional age at somewhere between 7 and 12.
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Repeat Till You Believe It: I Have the Right to My Privacy in THIS, Too
[Read the article: What's worse -- my breast cancer, or my relatives trying to "help" me?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]One of the good things about the world that we live in is that there are few, if any, subjects that are not considered OK to discuss in public. One of the bad things about the world that we live in is that too many people believe that this means that they have, therefore, the right to discuss all those things at length, at any time, no matter the feelings of those around them.
But when you, yourself, are seriously ill, then YOU get to call the shots. You absolutely have the right to say NO to anyone and anything that causes you distress during your battles with this cancer. As does your husband, on his own, and your, and your children's behalf.
If your treatment regimen, and your body's response to it, allows, the suggestion that you get away together is a fantastic one. Just the nuclear family, wherever you all decide is the place that you want to go. When my mom was at her sickest, she and Dad still took their yearly week in Door County WI. They were unable to stay in the little housekeeping cottage that they'd rented for the past 15 years, so went to a B and B that had elevators, the better to get to their room with Mom in a wheelchair. But they went, and were so happy to have done so.
My thoughts are with you, and your family.