It Has Been Way Too Long!

My last update was 1/20/09.  That was 11 days ago.  It feels like it has been a year.

Really, I don't have a great excuse for not updating.  I mean, I have been pretty busy trying to keep up with all my reading and homework for school.  Then there has been auditions, and film club, among other things.

Probably the greatest consumption of time has been fighting back and forth with my parents.  Why, you ask?  Three reasons.  These three reasons, however, combine nicely to form one main reason.

I'll start from the beginning.

My parents have always said that they want me to study abroad.  They wanted me to go for a whole semester because that way the cost would be equal to what it would cost me to study at MSU a semester, with no real additional cost (maybe like 200 dollars more, total).  After joining film club, and meeting BJ-M, I learned about a study abroad program that is perfect for me.  Basically, it's 6 weeks over the summer in London.  The program is called 'Film in Britain' and it consists of 9 credit hours (more if I'd like) and making my own film, pre-production to post-production.  There isn't another study abroad like it,  because it was created with the intent to cater directly to my major.

I told my parents about the program and they, obviously, wanted more information on it, cost, etc.  So, I sent them a heartfelt letter about how much I wanted to go and why, also including all of the finance information.  The program is expensive, I'm not going to lie.  It would be about 8,000 dollar more than it would cost for me to just take classes at MSU over the summer.

My parents said no to the program, after already letting me apply.  I understand completely that my parents can't afford it right now, however I really really want to go on this program.

I then asked my parents if I could take out a loan to finance the Study Abroad.  A note I should make is that my parents pay for everything for me- food, rent, utilities, tuition, everything (they never let me get a credit card or take loans out to pay for anything).  They said no to the loan.

This is where I get really upset.  I understand them not paying for it, but I don't get how they won't let me pay for it.  Most normal students have taken out at least one loan.  The worst part is- I'm in this position where I can't even take one out on my own without them cosigning.  My parents won't give me their financial information to fill out a FAFSA (document needed to get loans w/out a cosigner), and they won't cosign, plus I have no credit to apply on my own because they never let me build credit.

This leads me into reason 2 why we are fighting.  My parents never thought about the fact that their financial situation or the economy could change in the future.  So as I was young, and my brother was growing up, he got a lot that I never got.  For example, my parents financed two cars for him, out of state tuition, a 15,000 dollar study abroad program when he was in High School, study abroad when he was in college, and only a year ago they cosigned a 50,000 dollar loan for his graduate school.

What pisses me off the most out of all of those things is the loan.  They can trust my brother to pay back 50,000 dollars, yet they don't trust me to pay off a fraction of that.

I have a job.  I wouldn't even need to defer payments- I could start paying the interest now.  But no, my parents don't have that much faith in me, I guess.

The third reason is part of the second, in the fact that my car, Betty, is a total piece of shit.  She broke down on me in the middle of a main road the other day, and my parents weren't the least built helpful.  They payed for a car for my brother, then, when he sold it, put some more money into another car for him.  Yet my car, a hand-me-down from my grandma, keeps breaking down, and they aren't doing anything about it.

I may sound really ungrateful for all that my parents gave me, but I don't want you to think that.  I'm so grateful for everything my parents have given me in life, however, by giving me so much, they've debilitated me, in a way.  I'm so financially dependent on them because of it, that I can't even take out a freakin' loan on my own, whereas most students, who've had credit cards and such, could just get one without a cosigner based on their credit.

I have more to say on the subject, but this is long...

To be continued...