Logan Sachon: When did you first learn about your trust fund?

Lori Palmer: I think it was always something my grandmother said to me at my birthday “And I put some money in your trust fund.” Which meant nothing to me for a long time.

I didn’t really know how much was in the account until I was in my mid-twenties. There is $100K. (Which makes me nervous to say. Mentioning the dollar amount freaks me out.) Kanye West’s “Gold Digger” was really big at the time and I remember singing it to my then-boyfriend, because he was the gold digger. I now realize that it’s nowhere near that kind of money. 

LS: Tell me about your upbringing, money-wise.

LP: I was raised totally lower middle class. I think that’s why the trust concept never really penetrated my brain—growing up my parents didn’t have a lot of money. It’s not something that was talked about, but my sister and I are snoops. We had the power turned off on us, I know the bank started the process of foreclosing on our house. It was poor money management on my parents’ part.

Because there was no talking about money directly in my family, I think I just lived in fear of it all the time. As a kid, it just never occurred to me to ask my parents for money. I once paid $15 for a t-shirt with all quarters. Which I didn’t realize was a weird thing until I went to college. I can now recognize that my parents are a safety net that I can use, but it did not occur to me when I was younger.

LS: So besides this trust, you’re financially independent.

LP: Yes. My grandmothers did pay for my college, but it was important to me to never ask them for anything post-college. I didn’t want to feel beholden to them.

I am also the kind of person who deals with parts of my life and then informs my family “So I moved!” “So I am single!” “So I have been dating someone for a year!” My way of dealing with money might be more the way I also deal with my family.

LP: Do you have control of the money?

LS: I do not have control of the money. I will get a quarter when I hit 35, then another quarter at 40, and the remainder at 45. I am currently 31. It has been in existence for 16 years, and I just found out when it pays out.

I called the broker to find out about the terms of the trust. They told me I had to call up the executor to get the terms. My mom is set up as the executor of the trust and wants nothing to do with it. It almost seems like my mom is mad at my grandmother for making her the executor. But I called my mom, and she maintains she has no paperwork on how the trust was set up. So I called up my grandmother to ask her if she did. She told me to call my mom. Finally, my grandmother sent me the legalese that set up the account. That’s when I found out the payout dates.

I don’t really feel like the trust is mine. I want to be involved, but am I going to war with my grandmother over it, no.

LS: Do you think about that first payout date?

LP: If my grandmother who set up the account is still alive in when I get part of the trust in four years, which she will be cause women live long in my family, I have a feeling I won’t really get control of it. She will just decide to reinvest it.

LS: Do your friends know about your trust fund?

LP: Some do and some don’t. The majority don’t. There are two people I have actively talked to about it, because I am trying to figure out what I want to happen when I die. So I’ve asked them if they have a plan, or if they know lawyers. I feel so morbid when I say that! I am still young but should something happen, I want to know that things are taken care of.

My current boyfriend knows about it. I also know if we were ever going to get married that I would ask him for a pre-nup because of my trust fund. My parents are divorced which is influencing part of that. He has no interest in anything about my trust, and I don’t think he would ever try to stake a claim on it, but it is something I think about.

It is an amazing gift. Mostly I look at it as part of my retirement (I still hold onto the dream), or a deposit on a house.

LS: I’m interested in why it’s so hard to talk about it.

LP: I don’t want to come off as an entitled jerk. On the flip side, I support myself, have a decent amount of savings, a retirement fund set up, and I’ve started investing (investing is super boring). So maybe I should not feel so bad about myself.

Previously: My $10,000 Safety Net (Thanks Gran)

Logan: I just spent a long time reading Wikipedia pages about Easter and eggs and bunnies, and what I discovered was: Eggs and rabbits have been symbols of fertility and rebirth, forever, even Before Jesus, and then after Jesus, the egg also became a symbol of the tomb, though most people ignore that part. “Here, have this tomb.” Also, symbolism is great. That is what I learned today.

Mike: Did you and your family have typical Easter celebrations? Hunts and coloring eggs and such? I remember coming home from school one day and asking my mom if we could get an egg coloring kit and she asked, “Why? Why is this a thing?” Well, in so many words. Immigrant parents!

Logan: Haha I wish your mom said, “Why is this a thing?” We did do Easter stuff, but it sort of trickled off, unlike the Christmas thing, which we continue to this day. My major Easter memories are from when we were in elementary school and younger, when my mom’s parents were alive. We’d go to their house, which was a couple hours away, and my mom’s dad–who we called Papa John—would hide these candy easter eggs all over the yard for us to find. And my granny would make ham.

Mike: I remember really wanting to have one of those Easter baskets with a chocolate bunny and a coloring book and other junk tied up in cellophane, and again my mom would be like, “Ugh, those are terrible and a waste of money!” (Again, in so many words.) And she was right. They were a waste of money! But once my aunts and uncles started having more kids, they started trying to make it fun for us. So they’d buy the plastic pastel eggs and put candy in them and give it to us, and we’d be like, “No, you’re suppose to hide them.” And then my uncles and aunts would be like, “Okay!” And would then hide them in really difficult locations. Like up in a tree in one of our backyards. Or hidden in the rain gutter. And we’d spend all day trying to figure out how to get the eggs down. It was really fun, actually.

Logan: Ugh that sounds really fun. Yeah Easter was never my favorite of the Christian-commercial holidays. I have lots of Christmas memories, and I can remember believing in Santa for a long time, but I can’t remember ever believing in the Easter Bunny. I think maybe my parents were less into selling us on that lie. But we got Easter baskets when we were kids. Lots of candy, little stuffed bunnies. My mom was so good at stuff like that—planning birthday parties, making Easter baskets. She made us little bags on Valentine’s day, too—or a homemade card or flowers. But again, that stopped in high school. I think with Christmas, at least everyone is giving things to everyone, but Easter baskets were just for kids, and it was silly once we were older I think. Then the tradition became, buying Easter candy after Easter when it was half price.

Mike: I never believed in the Easter Bunny either—did anyone? A giant monstrous rabbit running around with plastic eggs? But we did celebrate Easter in a religious context, too. I also remember that the year we taught the adults to hide eggs, they decided the following year that they were going to do this thing where some of the eggs would have dollar bills in them, one of the eggs would have a five or a ten, and one of the eggs would have a $20. So we’d run around all day climbing trees, digging around bushes, and going around fences looking for eggs, and then we’d all open the eggs after we were done to see who got what. That was also fun. The adults liked holidays where they could give the kids money since we didn’t have allowances. Chinese New Year was the holiday where this is the most relevant—red envelopes with dollars in them and such.

Logan: You never had an allowance?

Mike: I was given $5 a week, but that was to buy lunch at school.

Logan: Are you speaking for all children of immigrants?

Mike: Haha. Yes, I am the spokesperson for The Children of Immigrants. Nah, I’m sure there were a bunch that received allowances! My family just wasn’t the sort. I’m sure I explained the concept of allowances to my folks at one point and they were like, “Haha. No, you do chores because that’s what you’re supposed to do—not for a reward.”

Logan: I didn’t get a regular allowance. I think my parents experimented with giving us allowances at some point—maybe in high school? But their style was more to give us money when we needed it, or when they felt we needed it. Like, when we were older, when it was time to buy new clothes for school, we’d each get some amount of money they’d decided on—maybe $100, I don’t remember. My brother would usually buy a pair of shoes, and I’d go to TJ Maxx and get one million shirts, or whatever.

Mike: My parents didn’t make a lot of money, so I think for them it didn’t make sense to give us allowances, and yeah, that’s what made holidays and birthdays something to look forward to—knowing we’d get a little something we could save or spend however we wanted. I’m not sure if I’ll be the type of parent who will give an allowance, although I thought I might be. I’d like to do some research on this. A future article!

Mike: Why don’t you start by introducing yourself?

Rich Person: I am 31, and my husband is 33. We have been married for three and a half years. I am a statistician and I work for a hospital in the research department. He has an MBA in finance and works for a bank. You can guess where the money comes from!

Mike: Your husband?

Rich Person: Indeed.

Mike: Can you tell us what your household income is?

Rich Person: Yeah, so this year we’re going to make about $360,000 total.

Mike: And you consider yourself “rich”, yes?

Rich Person: Absolutely, although it feels really weird to say that, and I have a lot of guilt about it.

Mike: Oh, interesting. Why is that?

Rich Person: Probably because neither of us grew up with any money at all. He was raised by a single mother who did her best, but had pretty bad financial habits; I had two parents and a stepparent who were all frugal but since nothing was ever frankly discussed, I didn’t learn much about money growing up.

We had everything we needed, but rarely what we wanted, if that makes sense. We both also spent most of our adult lives (which so far have been spent in college) really scraping by—we both had to live independently so we worked through undergrad and grad and got no help from our families.

Mike: Where did you and your husband go to college?

Rich Person: We both went to public state schools near our homes (we grew up in different cities). I got Pell grants and scholarships for undergrad, but it still didn’t cover everything so I have about $80,000 in student loans, mostly from grad school. He didn’t get as much help and a MBA is more expensive than an MS, so he has about $120,000 in student loans. When I think about $200K in student loans, my head spins. But then I think about our annual income and it seems proportional.

Mike: But your husband also knew he’d be pursuing a high-paid career too, right? So there was a plan of some kind—a vision that the debt would be manageable?

Rich Person: Yes, and actually we don’t regret the loans at all. We both like our jobs very much, and there’s no way we could be where we are without them.

Mike: So tell me about how you guys became “rich.” Was it gradual, or sudden?

Rich Person: Well, as you know, starting out a career in banking in 2008 was not the most confidence-inspiring prospect. His salary was $58,000 but we had no confidence in the stability of his job. My salary at the hospital right out of school was $48,000. Before we were married that felt tough (separate rent, bills, groceries, etc.) although a lot of that is because both of us reacted to growing up poor pretty badly—as soon as we had a few extra bucks we were buying rounds and ordering the filet.

Mike: This was in the middle of the recession, right? Maybe you were trying to jumpstart the economy?

Rich Person: We were dumb, and we both did stuff like that even when we were in school and struggling. I liked to treat my friends and would do so down to my last dollar, but thankfully I didn’t turn to credit cards. He had quite a bit of consumer debt when we got married from overspending that we paid off the first year we were both working our “real” jobs. He’s great with other people’s money, but his money is very much an emotional thing. We gradually got raises over the next couple of years, and then in 2011 he got his first real bonus, which just sent us over the moon. That was $65,000, which ended up being about $38,000 after taxes.

Mike: That’s somebody’s salary!

Rich Person: His bonus in 2012 was $85,000, and this year it will be $100,000. And the big, big change is that his base salary went from $65,000 last year to $160,000 this year.

Mike: How did that happen?

Rich Person: He got a new job with a major jump in title and responsibility. He’s the vice president of corporate finance at this new bank.

Mike: So we hear titles like that often. But what does that mean he does?

Rich Person: It means that now he has a fresh MBA to boss around! No, kidding. Sorta. He does manage someone now, and the department is brand new so with any luck he’ll be managing more soon. So corporate finance basically means they give and manage and split up loans to businesses. His new bank is relatively small so the businesses also tend to be small.

He also works 80 to 100 hours a week. Otherwise you’d be talking to him! He basically is home to sleep. He does usually get at least one full weekend day, though. And I work from home now so I’m always here. So, now with his basically $260,000 plus a $35,000 signing bonus and my $65,000 salary, our combined income is $360,000.

Mike: Your salary is much lower than your husband’s. Does that feel funny to you? Or it doesn’t matter because you’re married?

Rich Person: It doesn’t feel weird. We recently moved across the country for his new job, so rather than lose me my company decided to let me try working remotely. I used to have a nice big office while he had a cube, so that was pretty great. And honestly, it sounds kind of whiny to say it, but I often feel like a housewife with a full-time job.

Mike: Because you’re at home and your husband makes so much more?

Rich Person: Since he’s not able to spend a lot of time at home and he makes the big bucks, we’ve got a setup where I basically do all the house stuff, financial stuff, grocery shopping, pet care, and home decor decisions. We are both fine with that, and he does help out whenever he can. We’re in constant communication about things and neither of us feels bitter about our lot.

Mike: When you say financial stuff, does that mean: He basically hands over his paycheck to you and you figure out where it should go?

Rich Person: Yup. I pay the bills, I manage the budget, and since he’s pretty spendy-spendy, I give him an allowance!

Mike: How did you determine what that allowance would be? Can you talk about how much you decide goes into savings, or other accounts?

Rich Person: Sure. And this is where the irresponsibility remains. We have a great cash budget with wiggle room built in, and yet we blow it pretty much every month. We have it in a Google spreadsheet. We budget $400 per month “free cash” for each of us. In January he spent about $800 and I spent about $600. But I have a hard time being strict about this because we aren’t going into any debt for it.

Mike: What happens when you go over that “free cash” allowance? I mean, where are you dipping from?

Rich Person: There is a line item in the budget called “Excess cash flow” and for February, that is $6,202. So I mean, so what if I get dinner from the Whole Foods deli for $41? I have a hard time not doing stuff like that.

Mike: Is this excess cash supposed to go somewhere if you’re not spending it? Like a savings account? Or an investment account?

Rich Person: Well yes, we do have about $93,000 in a savings account and it’s basically an emergency account. We have about an equal amount split between a 401(k) and a Roth IRA.

We aren’t really saving for anything, though. We own a home in our old city that is small and has a $1,000/month mortgage. A family member is going through a rough time, so she is actually living there rent-free right now. We feel awesome that we can afford to help in that way, plus we know our house is being taken care of.

Mike: That’s really terrific.

Rich Person: I guess if we decided to buy another house in our new city we would get more focused about saving toward a down payment.

Mike: Did you buy the house after you moved, and your husband got his big job?

Rich Person: No, we bought it in 2010 when we were making a combined $110,000 a year. The house cost $108,000, and even though the bank kind of pushed us to borrow more, we wanted something we could afford on one income in case he lost his job.

Mike: That was very smart!

Rich Person: That’s one financial move that I am proud of! Plus the retirement savings, that makes me happy.

Mike: How much do you guys have in retirement so far?

Rich Person: About $92,000. He actually hasn’t set up his 401(k) with the new job yet, but we are putting $600 per month of my paycheck into mine.

Mike: So I think we all have different ideas of what it means to be rich. You and your husband went from growing up in families with little money. What did you imagine it would be like to be rich, and now that you are rich, does it live up to what you imagined?

Rich Person: I imagined being rich meant you no longer had any problems and were always happy. As a kid, I was always pretty embarrassed and grumpy about our trips to Goodwill for back-to-school clothes, and I used to daydream about going to the Gap (the Gap!) and buying whatever I wanted.

What I now realize is that the world around me is exactly the same as it was before. I still have to clean up after myself because I’m not butler-and-mansion rich, there are still potholes in the road, there are still ugly, desolate parts of town to drive through—it’s not like everything is perfect and rosy now.

Now, I do tend to walk into the Gap and buy stuff without looking at the price tag, and that gives me a little bit of a thrill and a sense of freedom. But I don’t do that at Nordstrom.

Mike: I think one of the reasons people stay rich is because they do look at price tags! Unlike all these pro-athletes we hear about who spend it all and then have nothing when they’re done with the game.

Rich Person: Exactly. I’m afraid of that happening! This could all be gone so quickly and easily. I didn’t look at price tags once at Macy’s, and ended up spending $1,000 on bedding! I paid it because I was too mortified to put most of it back, but I did go and return it the next day.

Mike: That must have been some good bedding.

Rich Person: I kept the sheets—high thread count is super worth it.

Mike: So, your husband’s big bump in pay is relatively new. When that happened, what were your initial thoughts about what you’d do with the increase in income?

Rich Person: The two dumb things we did in celebration of the new job were to buy an Audi, and rent a huge, expensive apartment. We are planners and budgeters (aspirational, mostly) so we had the monthly income figured out before he took the job.

Mike: Do you both still have student loans? Did you consider using your husband’s raise to pay those off?

Rich Person: We do, and that is our plan for his next bonus. I consolidated my loans at a dumb time because I didn’t know any better, so I have about $80K at 7 percent! His loans are more substantial, about $120K, but at 2.5%. Our minimum student loan payments are about $1,000/month.

The last two years we poured his bonus into the house because it was a fixer-upper, but it’s now in great shape, so we can shift those windfalls into getting out from this debt.

Mike: And you typically pay more than that, or are you waiting for the bonus to tackle it all?

Rich Person: We are currently paying the minimum, because when we moved we left almost everything behind. We had to buy all new furniture. But we’ll be done with that by next month, and if his bonus doesn’t cover my loans (it probably won’t because of taxes) we will put my entire paycheck each month toward the loans. There’s definitely lifestyle creep going on with the furniture, by the way.

Mike: Do describe!

Rich Person: So our old house was pretty much entirely by Ikea, and our couch was so bad, one of the legs was broken so if you moved it at all it would collapse. I got a chip on my shoulder about that couch and I’ve always wanted a sectional with a chaise, so I decided to go for it. It was $4,500. But god, it’s beautiful and comfortable and it’s microfiber so the cats can’t destroy it.

We got a $1,000 desk and two $150 barstools, and we’re shopping for a new bedroom set. The bedroom set isn’t entirely necessary since the one piece of furniture we brought was our bed, but he wants a solid headboard—ours is, like, iron bars. Seems like a silly reason to get a new bed, but I like furniture shopping!

Mike: And you can afford it now! What other kinds of things do you and your husband do now that you didn’t do pre-wealth?

Rich Person: Oh and I got an Aeron chair.

Mike: I don’t know what that is.

Rich Person: It is a $1,000 office chair by Steelcase and it feels like sitting on clouds.

Mike: I see! The chair has its own Wikipedia page!

Rich Person: Ha! Although, humblebrag, the one I got is too big for me so I need to go switch it for a smaller one. The damn seat goes too far out even when it’s all the way back. Anyway. So we both care about food a lot and we like to cook, so we get much better quality groceries now: organic as much as possible, local as much as possible, etc.

We upgraded the cat and dog food, and are helicopter parents to them—we take them to the vet at the slightest provocation now rather than worry about them. One had a stomach bug a few months ago and I was worried about an obstruction and of course it was Friday night, so we took him to the emergency vet and it cost $500 and I didn’t care.

Last year we decided on a Monday that we would be going to Europe that Friday for three weeks. We were lucky to have a cat sitter we trusted and made sure she was available, checked that our regular dog sitter could accommodate our dog in her house for that long, and bought the tickets. It was such a thrill to be able to take such a substantial trip on our own dime. Any previous vacations had been with our parents, so it was really satisfying to be on our own. Kinda felt like the first time you get a legal drink in a bar—like, “I shouldn’t be allowed to do this! Why is the bartender acting like this is normal? This is awesome!”

We drive around in an Audi, that is ba-nuts. I got a new car too, although it is not that fancy and I was going to get it even before he got the new job. It’s a Honda CRV and I love it very much even if it doesn’t talk to me or warm my butt.

Mike: Does the Audi talk and warm your butt?

Rich Person: Oh yeah—you can talk to it to make it do almost everything except steer for you and the passenger and driver seats have their own climate zones. If he wants to be 68 degrees and I want to be 70 degrees, the Audi lady will do that.

Mike: WOW.

Rich Person: Yeah. I bought some “just for his car” sunglasses the other day that match the paint job. I am so dumb. Bleh, it feels silly and wasteful!

Mike: But you also give to charity?

Rich Person: Yes. There is an organization that takes care of stray dogs in our home city—feeds them and builds dog houses for them, and we have always given to them but now we give a lot more. There is a group I recently found out about called Atheists Helping the Homeless in Dallas, and I just wrote them a check and will be writing more. And Planned Parenthood, love them. I’d have 10 kids if it weren’t for PP.

Mike: Do you and your husband want children?

Rich Person: I don’t think so; it’s not anything that interests either of us. Plus I’d basically be a single parent since he’s always at work! He doesn’t want to be an absentee father. If we change our minds about kids we’ll have to restructure our lifestyle and cut his hours down. We have nieces and nephews who scratch any itch we have to be around kids and we have college funds started for each of them.

Mike: That’s really nice.

Rich Person: They are quite young so they’re small accounts, but instead of buying them stuff for birthdays and Christmas we deposit into those. (Although I can’t help it, I still buy them presents.)

Mike: I think Logan had a post about that—about saving for her nephew rather than buying him stuff he won’t care about.

Rich Person: Since we both struggled so much in college and ended up so in debt, we would like to keep them from having to go through the same. My husband feels really strongly about that. They don’t need another piece of plastic junk lying around, but they do need an education. I think they can have a little of both! Oh, and they are the kind of funds where if the kid decides not to go to college they can use it for trade school or I think they can actually just use it for whatever, but if it’s not school then there are tax penalties. I don’t think that every single person must or should necessarily go to a four-year university so I made sure that they can make whatever choice they feel best suits them when they’re 18.

There’s only three of them so it’s not like this will be a billion dollar undertaking, but we like the idea of being the rich/crazy aunt and uncle and helping them out when needed. But to do that without making our siblings grouchy, is the thing.

Mike: Sort of like Rory’s grandparents in Gilmore Girls.

Rich Person: Haha. We shall not spoil them nor undermine their parents’ wills.

Mike: You will make them attend Friday Night Dinners, in exchange for free tuition.

Rich Person: Absolutely. Nah, I don’t like strings-attached gifts. That’s bull—All I want is for them to do their best and be happy, and we’ll try to set it up so they don’t have huge obstacles to overcome in order to do what they want in life.

Mike: So your husband works in finance, but do you guys have a financial planner?

Rich Person: We do, actually. She is the best. She helps us with choosing the right levels of insurance (auto, life, home, umbrella) and the right health insurance plan from work. She set up my Roth IRA, which I rolled over from my old job’s 403(b).

And we have some friends who use her, so when we put money into that friend’s kid’s college fund, she deals with it (college fund college fund college fund!). She also picks out and lords over all our savings accounts, basically – she finds ones with good interest rates and makes sure we don’t drain them to buy a boat without talking to her about it first. This was a rule we set up when we first started working together because we were honest with her about our past financial dumbness. We have not yet hired an accountant, but will be seeing one next week for the first time.

Mike: So your friends use her too, does this mean your friends are also wealthy? And if not, I’d love to hear how you navigate those relationships.

Rich Person: That particular friend is a work friend who is in a similar position as my husband, so yes. His other work friends are generally as rich or much richer than us. But our non-work friends are decidedly not rich. And that can get interesting.

So, example: Over the summer I was hanging out with two friends I’ve known for years and years, and we were outside just drinking and talking (drinking is probably an important thing to stress here). And one of them asked me how much money we make. Since my inhibitions were down, I said, “Oh yeah, totally! I don’t know why people are so weird about saying actual dollar figures anyway! Who cares?!” and I told him.

And then he basically spit it back at me five or six times that evening. That was pre-new job, so I think I said in the range of $200K, and he kept referring to me as “200,000 Dollars.” And it sucks, because I really like this person. I still do, and I chalk it up to drinking and me being dumb.

That is one bad example. Generally with the rest of our friends, everything is cool. We don’t invite them out if we know we’re going to spend $300 on dinner, because we don’t want to put them in a weird spot. When we hang out we go to regular places for dinner or drinks and we all pay our own bills, so that’s fine.

Mike: So that friend who knows, does he treat you guys differently now?

Rich Person: The next time we hung out I felt a little bitterness from him, but every other time after that it’s been okay. I don’t talk about money with my friends (anymore), and I try really hard to not sound like Lucille from Arrested Development when I’m talking about mundane things.

Like, I don’t bring up stuff that happened at the country club. Yes we had to join a club. And I say “had to” because it’s very much a work/network-y thing.

Mike: Oh, that’s definitely a rich person thing.

Rich Person: I feel much more comfortable with my non-moneyed friends. I don’t really enjoy the club socializing because it feels like work to me, if that makes sense.

Except the club itself is kind of cool because the food is really good, and if you buy a wine locker and store your wine there they bring you a giant spread of snacks that never stops all night. But I have to be a nice polite lady with social graces and conversation skills, which naturally I am not. I can’t wear my pajamas there, which is lame. I had to up my wardrobe game because it has a dress code.

Mike: Yes, I imagine it does. And lots of ladies lunching.

Rich Person: Yup. I don’t think I’ll ever be that? I don’t know. I’m more comfortable drinking at home than judging people over some white zin. I feel like a fraud sometimes when I’m there because I’m not highborn like a lot of them.

Mike: So we talked about your friends. But what about your families? You guys didn’t have much growing up, and now that you do, do they ask you for money? I mean, you are already allowing one of them to stay in your house rent-free for now.

Rich Person: Nobody has asked us for anything. I think they’re all curious about how much we make and I haven’t really told them. Before we moved, my little nephew asked “Are you guys rich now?”

And I didn’t really know what to say, so I told him that relative to the rest of the world we are all already very wealthy, but that we will have a little bit of extra money now. He was cool with that answer. I guess I would have to take any requests on a case-by-case basis. I feel like we shouldn’t loan any money that we aren’t comfortable with never seeing again, you know? Like, set it up as a loan, but be totally okay with it never being paid back.

Mike: I think that’s the right way to think about. Especially when it comes to family.

Rich Person: Yeah, I don’t want to fight about money. That’s uncomfortable for everyone.

My parents are in much better spots financially now than when we were growing up, so I don’t think it will come up with them. With his mother, given her history with money, I’ll never be surprised if she asks and we will probably always say yes.

He has tried managing her money for her and it gets weird because the parent-child role switches, so that doesn’t work. At this stage in her life we think it’s unlikely she’ll completely overhaul her attitudes toward money, so I think we will be taking care of her in some capacity for quite a while.

Mike: Yes, I understand a lot of how that is as someone who will be financially supporting my parents in their old age.

Rich Person: She did a great job raising a great son, she still works, she is a sweet and loving person, she just can’t manage money worth a damn. Even if we were strapped for cash we would always help her.

Mike: I think we covered quite a bit today! Anything else we should talk about that I haven’t brought up? What do rich people dream about?

Rich Person: Hahahaha. Let me think. A few nights ago I dreamt about a kitten who fell into a storm drain and so we put a lifejacket on one of our cats and sent her in after him. There was a helicopter search at night and everything. My husband thinks if you remember your dreams you aren’t getting quality sleep, so he never tells me his dreams.

I guess to sum things up I pretty much feel like the same person I always was, just with a lot more ability to do what I want. It’s true that money doesn’t make you happy, but it sure gives you a certain kind of freedom.

Previously: A Friendly Chat With A Rich Person ($140,000)

This Rich Person moved to the south and doesn’t even need a butt warmer.

Have questions you’d like this Rich Person to answer? Email Mike with “Question for a Rich Person” in the subject line.

Logan: This has been a week of not spending for me, because I already spent all my money and we don’t get paid for … some days. And this is fine. This is how it works, for me, for now. I spend my money and do what I want and then I have some days before payday where I eat rice and tortillas and stay home and it’s good. Rejuvenating. The only tricky part for me is, when friends ask to hang out, I never know quite what to say: “I wish I could but I have literally zero dollars?” Does that make it sound like I’m asking for them to cover me? I don’t want it to sound like that.

Mike: I think rather than say, “Hey, I can’t go out to dinner or to the bar because I have no money,” you can say, “I’m low on funds at the moment until I get paid next week, how about we [insert whatever fun activity that doesn't require money] instead?” Money is required to do things that require money, but it’s not required to just hang out with your friends. One of my friends just returned from a trip, and we haven’t seen each other in about a month, so if I don’t get snowed in this weekend, I’m planning on heading over to her apartment to catch up. “Just bring yourself!” she said. “I have wine!” I also think it helps to have friends who are just as happy to stay in and have a glass of wine and catch up on old episodes of Nashville, or Downton or Top Chef. I do have friends who are more than happy to go out and spend to have a good time, as well. It’s a balance, right? Some weeks you go out, some weeks you don’t.

Logan: I think there’s a difference between saying, I’m saving for this thing, and saying, my bank account has only enough money for my bills in it, that is it. Is it smart or good to be that vulnerable—to admit, I spent all my money, I’m low on funds—or if it’s something to be kept “hidden.” I mean, everyone knows everything about me because I tell everyone everything about me. I’ve just been thinking lately about other ways to live life. Like maybe, not tell everyone everything. And why one might do that. It seems novel, to me. Keeping a secret. Saving face.

Mike: I think it really depends on what kind of relationship you have with your friends. You and I have the sort of relationship where we’re completely candid about everything. You know all about my money and I know all about yours, and it’s all very good and fine. When we do go out, and you offer to pay for a drink or something I say, “Nope, I will pay for myself!” Because I know that’s not something you should be doing. And that’s completely fine and normal and nobody feels bad about anything. I also have friends where they don’t know all of my business and I don’t know theirs and it’s a completely different relationship. So maybe the difference here is that I only tell close friends everything, and you are just completely open to everyone about everything? And yes, I think having a lot of these matters posted on a website makes it a little more difficult to keep secrets—they just have to read our site!

Logan: Ha yes. I guess I’m thinking back to the Before Times (when I was using lines of credit), I used to get annoyed with people who were like, “Oh I can’t, I don’t have the money.” Because to me that just felt like an excuse. Haven’t you heard of Visa? Yuk, yuk, yuk. But then also it gave me an opportunity to be say, “Oh that’s all? I will pay!” Because I had heard of Visa.

Last night a friend bought me wine and pizza, but that didn’t feel bad because we sort of take turns having no money. Plus also I hate it when I offer to pay for you and you say no!

Mike: I’m trying to recall times when friends have said they couldn’t do something because they couldn’t or didn’t want to spend money, and what my reaction was. You know, it’s never been a big deal. My reaction has been, “Oh, okay, next time!” And we do have next time. And that is fine. I look forward to those next times! And I think it’s never been issue because when friends have said they didn’t have the money to do something, they always had a very reasonable qualifier for it. “We can’t go to dinner this time, because we’re saving money for our trip to Egypt.” Or because they’re putting money in a wedding fund, or whatever else. I think it’s important to recognize that there will be next times, and those times will be just as fun. And Logan, you know completely good and well why I turn down your offers to pay.

Logan: Ha, well, yes. This all basically comes back to self-loathing, I’m sure. Because you know, why am I out of money this week? Is it because of some actually really good reason? No. It’s because I had a bad couple of weeks and took myself out to too many dinners, oops. And then took a car home from a party, oops. And then went to the bar, oops. So I feel like, yeah, this is punishment in a way, not being able to hang out with friends, but also … it just seems weird to me not to tell people why. I don’t want to come off like I’m saying woe is me because I’m not. I mean, I am, but not in “pity me” way. I know I did this too myself. In other news, I no longer have a journal and am just using this website for that, apparently.

Mike: I do think “I can’t go out to dinner tonight because I spent all of my money and am waiting for my next paycheck” is a good reason to say you can’t do something. And let’s be honest here, the jig is up. I’m sure your friends know what the deal is. A number of faceless strangers reading our conversation right now know what the deal is. Not being able to go out to dinner because you spent it all shouldn’t feel like a punishment. You can’t punish yourself for not being able to go out to dinner because … you already went out to dinner! That’s where that money went. We can’t always go out to dinner (unless you are like Yaffa and work two side jobs to have the funds to do so). This is the truth of the matter. The reason I can go out to dinner with friends tomorrow is because this is a monthly thing we do with each other. We’re not going out to dinner every week, so we have the funds to have one nice one a month. You could say I punished myself by not going out to dinner last weekend so I could go out to dinner this weekend, but I don’t see it that way. So I think it’s about perspectives here.

Logan: Well thank god this has all just been hypothetical. I mean, I am out of money, that’s not hypothetical. But worrying about what to tell people when they ask me to do things I can’t afford to do? Have you looked out the window?! It’s a blizzard! No one is going anywhere tonight. Maybe it will last all weekend.

Mike: Forced austerity is sometimes the best austerity.

Logan Sachon: You are a young person who makes a lot of money: TRUE OR FALSE.

Rich Person: TRUE! I mean, you know, for certain definitions of “a lot”?? I do not have a yacht, and I live in an apartment. But yes I actually was looking through tax paperwork this morning and last year I made something around $140,000. Which is a very large looking number, if you ask me.

LS: Yes. To me you are basically a billionaire. I cannot distinguish between you and Warren Buffett.

RP: Yes I mean this is how I feel too! It is A LOT OF MONEY for a person of my relative youth and charm. (26, Super Charming.)

LS: SO YOUNG. SO CHARMING And so much money. How much money is in your checking account right now?

RP: My personal checking account, which is for day-to-day shit like “eating out” and “buying drinks” has $1,045.27. The joint account, which I share with my wife, that all my checks get deposited in is at $76,707.42. The joint savings account is $32,477. Our plan is to shift a lot of that out to, like, CDs or whatever, for mid-term savings once we meet with the CPA.

LS: So tell me. How did you get to a place where you were making this amount of money?

RP: So I am lucky, which is something successful people like to say about themselves if they’re not assholes (I heard that in an audiobook my dad was listening to), but is also very true. I am a contractor in the entertainment industry, and I make animated logos, commercial graphics, what have you, for film and TV. I used to want to be a video game programmer, then I learned I don’t actually enjoy programming things, I’m just good at it. So I changed to computer game ARTIST, which I spent a long time trying to get good at.

In high school, basically, I was self-teaching myself 3d animation programs, and I was soooo baaaad at it, but I was also dumb enough to not realize this, so I slowly got better and better until I was able to get an unpaid internship (!) the summer before college working at a company that did graphic animation stuff for television. They basically took advantage of me, but also taught me to use more animation tools. So I was able to keep doing work with them, and then other tv animation companies, while I was doing school. So school became, like, my day job, and then I got my actual education at night, working for these companies.

LS: When did you start getting paid?

RP: Let’s see … sophomore year of college I talked them into upgrading me to a paid intern, which meant I was getting paid literally minimum wage to do complicated animation things. It was such, SUCH a scam. I now know that the work I was doing was worth about 300 dollars a day in NY or LA, or maybe 200 if I was worse than I remember, but they were literally giving me 7 dollars an hour or whatever. But then on the flip side, I learned SO MUCH. All of my book-learnin’ college education was just, like, art history and context, but I learned all of my actual day-to-day skills on the job. Which I think is how it is for a lot of people? College gives you a foundation but the actual day to day skills are learned in an office.

LS: Yeah but not generally while you’re still in college! Did you know how lucrative this career could be eventually? Were you tempted to drop out and just get to work?

RP: I had no idea. I graduated in 2008 and was offered two jobs in the same state I was in school in: one at a game company, one at a smallish animation studio. Both encouraged me to drop out to work for them, both offered me around 50,000 or something like that, which straight out of college is a good deal! But I decided to move to LA, instead, where I got a job making I think it was 65,000, as a staff animator. Good money! Great money! Only later did I realize how low that is relative to what contractors make in this field. At every step I just felt lucky to have found a field I was good at, and that I enjoyed doing. Making money was, you know, a broad goal, but it’s not like I was my buddy who went to pharmacy school to get rich.

LS: What were your other friends doing during this time?

RP: Right after college I had one go to work at a defense contractor, making more than I was out of school… a bunch of art types went to grad school. Oh gosh, they ALL went to grad school. Imagine Ginsberg’s “Howl,” but about grad school. I know so many artists who decided that they weren’t gonna get work and went to get an MFA instead.

LS: Did you have loans from school to pay off?

RP: I did not, thankfully—I am, as I said, extraordinarily lucky. I went to a small state school nobody’s heard of, who paid me to keep my GPA over 3.25, and let me double major in what I wanted. So I treated them as, like, my 9-5 office job, while I was working on the side. I mean, also, I was crazy.

LS: Where did that work ethic come from? It just seems so wild to be in college and working that much, if you didn’t have to.

RP: I did about six years of school work in four years. I have no idea! I’m very lazy or I should say I’m very lazy, unless there’s a sort of systemic motivation. So in college, I was on a full ride scholarship that ran out after four years, so it was in my interest to milk that dry for four years and then leave. I took on these internships and low-paying side jobs because I knew I wouldn’t teach myself anything on my own, but if I had a company I owed work to, I’d do it for them. Basically I leveraged my worst psychological traits (anxiety, guilt) and used them to force me to work harder.

LS: Wow. That’s just really really smart reasoning for a college kid. Are your parents really hard workers?

RP: Yes. They are both management-types and both very successful. I grew up outside DC, where the assumption is you WILL be a successful meritocracy type person—lawyer/doctor/politician. So there was just a lot of hard work around me. Now I’m in LA and it’s hard for me to get used to the different expectations of what “hard work” means.

LS: So it sounds maybe like you found a thing you liked and were good and it was just lucky it wasn’t like … abstract painting. That the fact that it was also lucrative was a happy accident?

RP: Yeah, although on the flip side I put a ton of work into figuring out how to make a career out of what I liked. Like up until I graduated, I was thinking I might still do programming stuff, because I was gonna have a degree in it and I was good at it. So if it looked like I’d be scraping by not making money I don’t know if I’d have stuck with it.

The other thing is what I do is not really comparable to abstract painting—like I COULD use the skills I have to make animated shorts and try and get NEA grants and make little art pieces, but instead, I do commercial art. Because at the end of the day I like doing both of these things, but one of them will make money, too. I totally get that a lot of people won’t like the feeling of “selling out,” but for me that’s not really a problem. So I channeled my creative energy into a way to use the things I liked doing to get paid, too.

LS: I’m really interested in your peers, your friends, and how or if your success/their going to grad school changed things in your relationships.

RP: It’s funny, it did to an extent. I’ve found the people I knew in college who didn’t have a solid idea of what they were doing next tended to drift away from me a bit more. I mean part of it is how I moved so far away, too, but I’ve found the people I keep in touch with on the east coast all tend to have, at least somewhat, an idea of what they’re gonna do—whether that be teaching, or working in games, or whatever, they have a plan beyond “get an MFA.” I dunno if that’s a self-selection thing, or just coincidence, but that’s how it’s played out.

In LA it’s a little different. I didn’t know anybody here, and had to make a ton of friends out of nowhere, so there’s a big range of like… position-in-career. I have friends who are in the same field as me, and friends who are struggling writers, and friends who don’t really have a plan beyond paying rent. And it can be awkward.

LS: Let’s talk about THAT.

RP: Let’s! I mean if nothing else, in LA in your 20-something crowd you’ll have people making anywhere from $15,000 a year to, I guess, $140,000 a year in my case, so finding things to do that won’t be awkwardly expensive, finding ways to buy rounds without getting weird about it, it’s all gotta get navigated.

My wife and I have taken to hiring our friends to catsit for us and, like, it is a valuable service we are paying for, but I get awkward about how much they feel like they’re becoming our SERVANTS because we’re paying them, and we make enough money that I’d be so uncomfortable NOT paying them.

LS: Do you feel like there’s an expectation from your friends that you’ll buy dinner or drinks or whatever when you go out?

RP: Sometimes! Not always, and not in a way I’m uncomfortable with.

LS: I have a few friends who make A Lot More Money Than Me and I do find myself falling into that expectation sometimes, just feeling .. um this person will probably be getting the check and then being kind of surprised if we split it. NEVER OUT LOUD. But like I said, six figures to me sounds like INFINITE MONEY.

RP: Listen I make six figures and it FEELS like infinite money…until it’s all gone. Like, yes, everyone knows we make more money! And I would rather pay for a friend than have them not come to an event. But, also, obviously this doesn’t apply to EVERYTHING, right? A friend just had her car break down, and part of me was like “We could just… pay for that! Right now! Out of the checking account!” But then where does “giving your friends money” stop? I do not know!

LS: Yeah! That actually seems to me to be a stressful situation to be in actually.

RP: It can be! I got married last year, and my wife is in grad school and is way, way, way better at not-spending-money than I am. She was able to save more money than me while making 1/3rd as much before we got married. So as a result, we did a big Finances Unifying thing, and now I have a monthly budget. Which is usable for, like, personal things, which includes buying people drinks and paying for meals. And that new budget is a tiny fraction of what I actually make per month. Soo as a result now I feel like I’m spending less on friends than I did, but also saving a lot of money to use for things like “maybe buying a house” or “not starving to death if I run out of contract work.”

LS: Do you friends make rich people jokes to your face? Do they constantly describe themselves as poor?

RP: Some friends are always describing themselves as poor, but I’ve also basically learned to never trust someone’s “emotional description” of how wealthy they feel. Everyone feels poor sometimes, and unless you know why they feel that way it doesn’t mean much! I don’t really get many rich people jokes, but that’s probably more because I am in an apartment and I just have one practical car. I know guys in my field that drive crazy-ass Audis and they definitely get a lot of “rich white dude” jokes.

LS: Do you think having money made you more mature? It seems like maybe not since you were so mature before. But … do you feel like you’re more mature than your friends without money? And is it the money that made you mature? Or are you more mature by nature and and … therefore have money? Can one be poor and mature?

RP: I am really hesitant to answer this just because, you know, what is maturity? But I guess I can say: I feel like everyone kind of has an “internal age” of what their brain acts like, and mine is definitely something around 32 years old. Has been for years! That said, if I lost my money tomorrow I think I’d still be mature, just way more stressed and worried and anxious, all of which acts to keep you from acting maximumly mature.

LS: Were you a rich person when you met your wife? Is your wife a rich person? I guess you are, collectively, now Rich People.

RP: She has basically seen a broad arc of my career. We started dating before I came to LA, so she saw me making no money on internships, then making a good amount and then in the last two years, when I went freelance, making A Lot Of Money.

LS: Can you talk about that transition? Was the money the reason?

RP: In part! There was a lot of shaking up at the company I was at. A lot of people leaving. The work wasn’t as satisfying as it had been when I started, and I had this buddy who was a contractor who kept saying he was making $600/day. Which I literally did not believe, but now, being out in the contractor world, is completely reasonable (“reasonable”). So to compare I was making… $78,000, I think, when I quit. I immediately jumped from that to six figures aaand have been raising my rate since.

LS: What small things changed when you hit six figures—anything? Did you upgrade to $20 bottles of wine instead of $10 or $15? Do you shop at J.Crew now instead of the Gap?

RP: My wife’s spending increased tremendously—she’s in grad school, so having disposable income changed her life a lot, in terms of material goods. For me, I mostly stopped caring about how much I spent on things like eating lunch out, or buying books and video games, or whatever. Furniture got a big upgrade, too, just cause all my stuff was Ikea moving-to-a-new-state stuff from four years ago. Switched up to Room and Board instead. (Privileged people sentences.) I also started spending money on fine liquors, and throwing parties for friends, because I like hosting and it’s a lot easier to do that when you can just buy $200 in alcohol without it being a big deal. Now I find I’m trying to ratchet myself back down to my sub-rich-dude spending so I can work on paying for a house eventually.

LS: Did you become a republican?

RP: NOPE. I’m proud to pay taxes. I am firmly of the… “jesus, that is a lot of money, who cares if the government takes some” family. And also, when you aren’t doing W2s, you start to realize how many things are actually luxuries that you can choose to spend money on or not, like, knowing what I spend on my vacation days, or being able to just take a month off if I like.

I might technically make “less money” doing that, but it is still a thing that has value, you know? There is more to being successful than the biggest paycheck. Ironically, getting a bigger paycheck is making me realize this.

LS: Do you describe yourself as middle class?

RP: NO NO NO NO NO. I AM RICH and I don’t LIKE having to say it, because this is AMERICA but I am definitely rich and that’s ok and maybe if I remember how lucky and good I have it I’ll be able to help other people more than pretending that I am just an average joe.

LS: Do you consider yourself part of the 99 percent? OR THE ONE PERCENT.

RP: I mean I feel like socioeconomically, I’m really in the one percent, but that if you are even willing to consider this, then maybe you can avoid the gross trappings of one-percent-ness? E.g. spending all your money on sending your kids to private school and then acting like this is a BASELINE NECESSITY, and thus calling yourself middle class?

LS: Do you do stocks and stuff? (“stocks and stuff”)

RP: My favorite big box retailer! We have money in retirement funds (Roth IRAs) and we have index funds. I know a lot of the guys I work with are stock jockeys. They do day trading shit and get real intense about like 2-hour get-rich-quick things in the markets. III… don’t. I’m young! I can make money over a long period of time. That said, we’re gonna be meeting with an accountant tomorrow to talk about incorporating. So maybe he’ll be like “go buy every stock” “build yourself a throne out of stock certificates”

LS: “Just buy the stock. All of it”

RP: “BUY! BUY!” he’ll shout.

LS: Is there anything else you have to say about being rich?

RP: Just that… if any of YOU dear readers become rich, work really really hard to remember that you are rich. Also, buy higher thread count sheets. They are WORTH IT.

This Particular Rich Person lives in Los Angeles. 

Martha Kaplan and I are both depressed.

This is the second in a series of conversations about depression and money.

Logan Sachon: You said something in our first conversation that I keep thinking about.

Martha Kaplan: I’m pretty depressed, so it’s a good day for it. Go on.

LS: You were explaining why you’ve chosen not to use your real name for these chats, and you said: “It is hard to be respected in your place of employment when it is known that you sometimes cannot get out of bed.” (basically)

MK: Ah yes.

LS: And I’m wondering: Does your employer know about your mental health adventures? Past employers? Who gets to know, and who doesn’t?

MK: This is an interesting question. I have an office job now, but I used to be in a job that required me to supervise children. I was very young, and I didn’t have a particularly strong backbone (this was a thing that my supervisor told me once) (she was not trying to be mean). And what ended up happening was I would cry in front of the children. It happened more than once. A handful of times, I think? But it made it so, so, *so* much harder to go back the next day and command respect. Not that I was getting much before. Hence the crying.

But that was a lesson. Obviously, if they see you’re weak, they’ll respect you less, but children are just more honest humans. If you cry at work, you will get less respect. Or if you talk openly about being depressed, you will be seen as weak. Unreliable. (It’s a particularly fine line for a woman to walk) (because if you’re too aggressive, you’re seen as a bitch) (competent, strong, but not too strong, and not too threatening—please be all of those things). 

Anyway, this is not to say that I haven’t cried at my desk. I have, and I’ve told my co-workers, the ones I’m close with, some details about my mental state. There is one coworker in particular whose office I would sit in sometimes when I was freaking out, but this person was supposed to be mentoring me, so it felt okay to be vulnerable (or rather I felt like I had no choice). I honestly kind of regret that now. I had a panic attack at work once, and I joke about being in therapy because I feel like you’re allowed to do that in New York. But no one who’s actually in charge of me knows that I’m fifteen minutes from totally losing my shit at any given moment. Because honestly, if they did know, why would they give me anything to be in charge of?

LS: Do you think that person who is your mentor “gets” it?

MK: I think there’s an age difference that makes it hard. Part of me feels that, as a youngish woman, there’s no way that my “depression” will be taken seriously. I don’t think my mentor thinks my problems are a joke, but I also think that it’s easy to dismiss a twenty-something having panic attacks as, you know, just a girl going through a phase.

LS: This is something that I struggle with, even myself. Because even though I know that I have a Disease, that depression is a Disease, that I cannot Snap Out of It, that it’s not that I’m just not trying hard enough, that there are actual chemicals in my brain that are keeping me from being The Best Possible Me All The Time …. I still think sometimes (all the time?) that my inability to snap out of it is a personal weakness.

So if I can’t believe there is something physically or chemically happening that is making basic tasks so hard, or if I don’t, why should anyone else?

That said, I have been very open with most of my employers about the fact that I have been diagnosed and sometimes have to deal with being Clinically Depressed, mostly because I am very open with everyone about everything, and lying about that particular thing seemed harder and more stressful than just being out with it.

But I’ve never disclosed it preemptively—it’s always been when I’m basically already in crisis, or getting there, and feel I need to somehow justify my behavior (like, looking very morose) (or being late) (or subpar performance, or what I perceive as subpar performance).

MK: So what do you say?

LS: Well it’s hard. There isn’t really standard accepted language for what is happening. Depressed means so much more than whatever is in the DSM-IV. And I certainly am not precious about it. “Ugh, I’ve watched all of Game of Thrones , I’m so depressed” is just as legit a use of the word as “I’m sorry that I have been letting you down in every way lately, I’m depressed.” But they don’t mean the same thing. And I don’t love to use that word, really maybe because I do feel like it discounts what’s going on. I don’t know. When I’m in a bad place, that is, a depressed place, I describe it as “a dark place” or “a low place.” That language feels pretty apt to me. But that’s also very casual language.

Which is why it’s good, I think, to have a diagnosis and to medicalize it as much as possible. When I’ve felt the need to disclose it, I try to say, “I’m clinically depressed. I’ve had it under control but my meds have stopped working. I’m seeing a new therapist, I’m looking for a doctor to regulate my meds, this is what’s happening.” Using that language also helps me deal with self-loathing—it’s not me, it’s my disease.

MK: Interesting. I think one of the things I have been good at is faking it when necessary. I was talking to a friend today about how I feel like I have enough energy to do one of two things: either work or take care of myself. And I always choose work, no matter how awful I feel. Even if it makes me feel awful. I do enough to make sure I’m not insanely worried about getting fired. Or rather, I do enough so that when I tell people I’m insanely worried about getting fired, they tell me I’m crazy. I think work is a coping mechanism almost, like a way of avoiding the problem. Which is why it’s important that no one know that I actually have serious issues at work.

LS: The jobs that have been best for me, as far as being able to separate what is going on in my head and getting a job done, have been retail jobs. The jobs have been with larger companies, the policies are set by corporate, you clock in, you clock out, if you’re late three times, you’re fired. These are the jobs where I have not disclosed anything, because it doesn’t matter. Rules are rules and if you break the rules then you’re out. That kind of structure was good for me, I think.

The other jobs I’ve had—writing jobs, editing jobs—have not been so stringent. There is a bare minimum of things to be done, yes, but then also almost infinite possibilities of what Could be done. And when I’m struggling and when I’m just making it through doing the bare minimum, I feel the need to disclose what’s going on. I want to be an A+ amazing worker. And sometimes I can’t be. And it’s not because I’m lazy. Or maybe it is because I’m lazy. But it’s chemical imbalance-induced laziness.

When I’ve been in a bad place, and disclosed my depression, I’ve always encountered really understanding and lovely coworkers and bosses. And I think part of that is also that I have mostly worked at small companies, so these people have all been my friends, too, so they’ve been sympathetic and understanding and wanting to help and cut me a break.

But now I wonder if disclosing this to these people and accepting their help didn’t …. lower the stakes for me. Like, at the retail jobs, I’m going to show up no matter what because I know that if I don’t I will get fired and there is no recourse. But once people know, even if I don’t want it to be like this, once they know that I’m having a hard time, it makes this thing that I Had to get out of bed for, less of a Had? If that makes sense.

MK: It does. I mean, I do think depression is a real disease. I don’t think this is “in your head,” but I do think that you can lean into it or fight it. Or actually, you can be lucky enough to have the resources and support be able to actually take the time to try to fight it. Like, you can be financially stable and part of some miraculous supportive family that will pay for you to go to therapy and yoga all the time or something. Which is a small number of people. Or you can use all of your energy fighting to stay afloat. But when you’re using all of your energy fighting to stay afloat, you get tired, and eventually you just want to give up.

I think maybe telling your employers about your issues made it easier to allow yourself to give up. Which is not the same as saying you’re lazy. It’s more like, a regular person will take advantage of having flexible deadlines to a certain extent, but for a person who has depression, that’s almost like a trigger. You don’t want to take advantage, but you do because you’re normal, and then you feel awful about it, and then you do it more and more, because that makes you feel more depressed and you’re fighting harder just to keep yourself, like, not in a huge amount of pain and you can’t do the thing you were supposed to do ages ago.

LS: The Spiral.

MK: I think the idea is: Can work be a place that forces you to be healthy? And is that a good thing? I think it can be, but also, I feel a lot of the time like I’m choosing work over myself. Because being competent at work makes me feel baseline competent, even though my entire body is screaming that I’m not okay.

Doing your job while also having depression or mania or whatever is hard enough. Doing your job while also worrying about judgment, is too hard, is my feeling. But that’s also a product of how there is a stigma around mental illness. And it’s not well understood. It’s like, would I try to hide the fact that I had diabetes from my employer because of concerns that I would “take advantage” of that for more sick days? No.

LS: Right, or hide behind that diagnosis somehow. Do you take sick days?

MK: Not frequently. Once because I was extremely sad. That was awful.

LS: And did you say, “I’m extremely sad”?

MK: No I said I had the flu. One of these things is definitely not your fault (the flu). One of them seems like it might be (being sad).

LS: Another good thing about the retail jobs I’ve had is that, just like there are rules for being late and getting fired, there are also clear rules for calling out and for covering shifts. And, if I needed to, I did call out sick from those jobs—I knew the number of days I had, and I used them. Never more than was allowed, and never when I knew it was going to really mess anyone up.

But it was really a no judgment system. You didn’t have to fake it. You just called and talked to a manager and said, “I’m calling out today.” And something about that let me take some much-needed “mental health days” without the guilt—I hadn’t done that before. If it was really bad, I had lied and said I was sick, or worse, I wouldn’t take a day at all when I really, really needed one because I’d felt that I should be able to talk myself out of bed or whip myself into shape.

And I hate lying. But yes, I’d say the flu. Or a fever. Or terrible menstrual cramps. All of that is easier than saying, “I just can’t make it out of bed today.”

Of course a lot of that had to do not just with the policies but with nature of the work—other people could do my job at the stores. Most of the jobs I’ve had, that hasn’t been the case. A sick day just meant no one was doing what needed to be done, or someone was having to do my job on top of their job.

MK: So the system that was in place at the store allowed you to take care of yourself without taking advantage. That’s insane. That sounds like a dream

LS: It was a good place. Good for me. Are you aware of anyone else at your office with mental unhealth? Are there people that talk about it?

MK: I know several people here are in therapy, but I doubt anyone else has a diagnosed thing. Is my feeling. But maybe that’s just me wanting to feel special.

LS: Ha, yes. We are so special. Magical butterflies of sadness. Superheroes of hating ourselves. Would we just had, like, different colored eyes, or photographic memories. I thought we were going to end up deciding that it would be better to be More Open About Our Depression at Work, but it seems like maybe we’re thinking … no. Keep it secret, keep it safe. But that seems wrong. I mean, one of the hard things about being depressed is that it’s not something that a lot of people accept as even a valid disease, so maybe we should be talking about it more (hence these conversations). But what if everyone at your work is also miserable and you’re all suffering silently? You could have a support group … of depressed people. Do we owe it to each other to talk about this openly at work?

MK: I think the key is that I am healthy enough to get my shit together and come to work and pretend to be fine, so no, I wouldn’t want to be reminded of how hard that is and how close I am to not being able to do that by having a support group at work. But also, there are people who are not healthy enough to have regular jobs, and maybe support groups would help get them to a place where they could.

LS: I’m very interested to read about other people’s experiences with telling or not telling at work. And I’d love to talk to some people who don’t Suffer From Depression about what it’s like to work with people who do Suffer From Depression. And as for you and me, we’re both going to keep doing the best we can. I’m going to do that by eating an apple. I am guessing that you are going to continue to work on your work. Thanks for chatting. I’m sorry you’re feeling bad today.

MK: It will be fine. It will pass. It always does.

Previously: Depression and Money: Some Real Talk

See also: How to Lose Four Months to a Depression/Spending Death Spiral

Remember graduation? Remember what your speakers talked about? I vaguely recall something about never forgetting about what my dreams are, and to remember to do something that I love and that will make a difference in the world because I am the future. Something about living each day like it’s my last—you know, a bunch of stuff that was supposed to inspire and encourage us while we pursued our individual careers. And then we all went off into the real world and learned how the real work is done.

This is why I enjoyed reading Brian Keene’s speech to aspiring writers at a boot camp at Towson University earlier this month. There’s a lot of useful information in his speech! Keene has written several books under speciality publisher Borderlands Press, as well as a number of comic books—mostly about zombies.

Here’s Keene on why he decided to be a writer:

I have been a full-time writer—meaning writing is my only source of income, and how I provide for myself and my loved ones—for a little over a decade. My commute is great—from the bed to the coffee pot to the computer. I get paid to make up stories about zombies and giant carnivorous worms and people give me money for them. Not a bad gig. Usually. But there’s a lot more to it than that. Writing is a hard way to earn a living, and the costs are high. Too high, at times. And yet, I continue to do it because the rewards are unlike those of any other profession I know. And I continue to do it because I can’t do anything else. I can’t not write.

On what you can expect to earn if you want to write fiction:

If you choose to publish via traditional means (publishing companies) then understand that your pay will be sporadic. When your novel is accepted, you will receive an advance. The average advance these days, for a genre fiction novel, ranges between $2,500 and $10,000. That’s right. The novel you spent a year working on only earns you between $2,500 to $10,000 at first. When the book is published a year later, that advance will have long been spent. And you probably won’t see a royalty check until another year AFTER your book has been published (provided enough copies have sold to earn out your advance). So it will actually be two years from that advance check before you get paid again.

And some more real talk about earning money:

I’ve been on CNN, Howard Stern, a documentary on the History Channel, and a trivia question answer on an ABC game show. My readers include rock stars, movie stars, stand-up comedians, professional athletes, a few politicians, a few more porno actresses, and even a daytime soap opera diva. I am one of the most popular horror writers of my generation. I say that not brag or sound arrogant, but to set the stage for what I am about to tell you. I am one of the most popular horror writers of my generation—

—and on average, I make between $30,000 and $40,000 per year. Sometimes it’s a little bit more. Sometimes, it’s less. That’s an average.

He also goes into some personal details about how his work has affected some of his personal relationships:

My first marriage dissolved when I was trying to become a professional writer. We lived in a trailer and had about three dollars to our name. I worked all day in a foundry (and later as a truck driver) and then came home at night, and focused on my word processor, rather than my wife. I was young and dumb and it never occurred to me that my equally young wife might like me to spend some time with her rather than writing. Even when we did spend time together, we didn’t really communicate.

And there’s more! Now this is the sort of thing I would have loved to hear at a commencement ceremony: real talk about money, about careers, about life.

Mike: One of the things we examined this week was what debt means to us as individuals. What should we think about when paying it off? There is no one right answer, of course, because debt means something different to each of us. So let’s talk about this. Logan, your debt is all consumer, right? You don’t have any student loans.

Logan: Yes, mine is consumer debt. Consumption. Ha. Yes. But it is an interesting division. Does the kind of debt matter, psychologically? When I had a car loan, I thought about that debt differently than I thought about my credit card debt.

Mike: How so?

Logan: I’m not sure. I didn’t think about the car debt, at all. So much that when I was adding up my debt last year, I had to be reminded to factor in it. To me it was another bill. But the credit card debt totally felt like this disgusting black cloud. DARK. TERRIBLE. DANGEROUS.

Mike: Maybe it’s because the car is something you needed and were happy to pay for, while your consumer debt was mostly a bunch of stuff that you wanted, but could have survived fine without. I feel that way about my student loans. I’d probably freak out about credit card debt and would want to pay it all off ASAP, but with my loans, they’re there, I pay them every month and don’t really think about it. My interest rates are pretty low and the interest accrued adds up to less than $2,500 a year, which is the deduction limit for student loan interest come tax time. Anyway, that’s boring tax talk, but what I’m getting at is that I’m not too worried about it. I know they’ll be paid off by the time I’m in my 40s—possibly sooner. And in the meantime, I can live pretty comfortably.

Logan: The car was a decision made with a sound mind, and it’s a decision that I didn’t have to validate or feel bad about. I needed a car, I bought a car, I got insurance, I made my payments. It was a good car but a modest car. The payments were reasonable. There was no sense of, I’ve really screwed myself here (though there were months when, sure, I bemoaned my month payment and thought, I’ve really screwed myself here!). The credit card debt was different in that it was a lot of tiny decisions that I validated at the time (I deserve this dinner out, I need this haircut to feel better about myself) but added up were not so easily defensible. “I spent $20K to make myself feel better,” just doesn’t work the same way, “I spent $20K to get to and from work” does. Sometimes I’ve toyed with the idea of thinking about it almost like a medical debt. I spent that money on regular sessions with a not very good or effective a therapist, called dinner and a bottle of wine.

Mike: But you also don’t feel the need to pay it off ASAP, right? I mean, the way I’d feel about it, or the way Lisette and her partner have decided to tackle it so aggressively. I don’t think I would tackle it as aggressively as they did/are, but I do think I’d make paying it off a priority.

Logan: Well, there was a time when I for sure felt like I had ruined my life by racking up this credit card debt, and that I wouldn’t be able to “start my life” until I paid it off. I’ve since changed my mind about that, mostly. I don’t feel ashamed about it anymore, mostly. But I didn’t ever feel that way about my car debt. I didn’t feel like the car payment held me back in the same, way, psychologically. Even though the payments, well at least for a long time, was pretty similar. I think it has something to do with the fact that interest rates on the cards are high, and so there’s this sort of feeling that I can’t save any money, that I need to pay off the cards first. But … I also don’t want to not spend any money? So in my head, it’s always been, pay bills, live, pay off cards further with extra if there is extra (the only time I’ve managed to have “extra” is when I’m close to paying off a card and just want it gone!), and then ONE DAY, I’ll save for …. something.

Mike: It’s all about finding that balance and whatever will work for you to reverse that debt back to zero. I think it’d be unrealistic for you to go from charging things without thinking about it to magically breaking all your bad habits and focusing all of your money to get your credit cards paid off. But I also think it’s fine for people to want to do that—to go through a period of misery in pursuit of some bigger goal in mind. I think about my parents—how when they were my age, I was already old enough to start school. And I think about how we lived in this awful one-bedroom apartment together—my family of five—for a few years until they had saved up enough money for a down payment for a house. I don’t remember it being so miserable, but I’m sure it was for them. They made it seem like we were one big happy family in that single bedroom, but I’m sure in the back of their minds, they were like, “The kids need their own rooms! We need our own space!” And then I was in third grade, and we had a house, and a backyard, and all that temporary misery was worth it. So, I don’t know why Lisette and her partner are putting themselves through hell while shedding their debt or what their end goal is, but I do have an understanding of why people do it.

Logan: I used to wish I was the kind of person who could do that, I used to daydream about moving somewhere and doing a job—oil fields! cruise ship dishwasher! I don’t know—where I’d work all the time and have zero places to spend money and I’d just do it for a year and then I’d pay off my debt and I’d start fresh. I do like the idea of starting fresh. But it’s not something I’m actually interested in doing. And to people who are? Bravo.

Mike: Bravo, indeed. Bravo to anyone who figures out the thing that works for them when it comes to debt (or savings, or just living, basically).

Here is a story about an Indian man who spent $22,500 on a solid gold shirt to get the attention of women. It’s certainly something that would grab anyone’s attention! But maybe not in a way that would get him a date? I’m not a dating expert, so I asked Chiara Atik, who writes about dating for How About We, and who had a lovely post about her trip to Paris on The Hairpin earlier this week.

I just want to know whether or not you’d think you (or anyone for that matter) would be interested or impressed by a man who decided to spend $22,000 on a solid gold shirt to get your attention.
I wouldn’t be impressed, no, but anyone who doesn’t think this is an effective strategy has lived a happily sheltered life. I’m only surprised he felt the need to splurge on such an ostentatious shirt in order to get someone to marry him for his money…surely a simple flashing of a bank statement would do the trick?

Yes! Totally true, but it’s hard to get someone’s attention with a bank statement from a distance. How would you feel about a man who silkscreened his bank account balances on a t-shirt?
Ha! Again, I personally would not feel suddenly attracted to him, but I”m sure it would do the trick for some women!

Yeah, I’d much rather wear a shirt that says: “I have $50 to spend on a dinner date. Interested?” Ack! Actually, the thought of doing that terrifies me, and I’d never do that.
Yeah in some ways it’s silly to think that money doesn’t influence desirability, and if you feel like money is the only thing you have going for you, why not be upfront about it? (Talking about the man now, not you, ha.) But someone who ONLY has money to offer is going to get someone who ONLY has [looks? sex? youth?] to offer, it’s not going to be the deepest of relationships, but who’s to say a golddigger and a gold-wearer can’t be happy together, if that’s really all they’re both looking for?

The novelist Benjamin Anastas’s new memoir Too Good to Be True is an unflinching account of a lean period in the writer’s life. Marked by financial and romantic uncertainty, his challenges and frustrations will be familiar to anyone who has ever dodged a debt collector, borrowed money from friends, or felt they were falling irreversibly behind. Mr. Anastas also reveals the bleak fiscal realities behind a seemingly enviable literary career. He was kind enough to answer a few questions over email.

Michael McGrath: In Too Good To Be True you lay out your financial situation in pretty stark terms. Bills, credit card statements, student loans, etc. I don’t even like to look at my account balance at the ATM. How cathartic was the writing of this book? Why do you think money is so hard to talk about?

Benjamin Anastas: Money is hard for people to talk about because we associate it with so much more than spending power. That bank balance you don’t want to check at the ATM? It’s a measure of your value. I mean, who wants to see their life laid bare on a slip from the ATM? I sure don’t. I did find it cathartic to write about being broke in the memoir, though, if only because once I put it down on the page, I could laugh about it instead of just feeling crushed and demoralized. Taking your son to buy groceries with a baggie of change is a humiliation you won’t soon forget. But when you can write about it from the inside and put it in a book, the experience is easier to swallow.

MM: The Coinstar scene, in which you scrounge for change to buy your son Pirate’s Booty, is emotionally complex and highly relatable. It also seems to prompt some memories of your father. Did the writing process reveal anything new about your family’s history with money and surrounding issues?

BA: It did help me see for the first time how I had inherited some of my family’s hang-ups about money. This isn’t necessarily true for my brother and my sister, who have been much smarter about their financial lives than I have, and I don’t want to place too much of the blame on my parents–I’m the one who celebrated my first two book deals by quitting decent jobs. The book poses a fundamental question: how much of our lives do we get to write, and how much of them are written for us? Using Coinstar to buy groceries with my son opened up a wormhole to my earliest experiences of money, when we never had enough. 

MM: You talk a little bit about banking while poor and your growing disillusionment with your bank in particular. Are you still getting slammed with fees? Have you switched banks or are you still getting the dog treatment?

BA: I switched to a different bank after finishing the book and I swore to myself that I wouldn’t “play the zero line” this time and keep racking up the $35 overdraft fees. Easier said than done, though. All banks are the same when it comes to gouging the consumer who’s struggling. It’s a fool’s errand to try and outsmart the personal banking combine.

MM: Were/are you prepared for people/readers to scrutinize your spending habits? It seems to me that the hardest part of being poor while living in the financial capital of the world is fighting that urge to spend what otherwise might be considered meager sums on everyday expenses.

BA: Sure, there’s plenty of opportunity to scrutinize my choices. I know enough about financial planning to realize that some of my priorities were way out of whack. Did I really need an iPhone? Couldn’t I have fielded the collection calls on a cheaper device? When I was taking home $192.63 a week in unemployment, did it make any sense for me to keep getting an $85 haircut? That’s where living in New York really encouraged my natural tendency to always act like everything is fine, to pretend that I’m “Too Good to Be True.” New York is a city that runs on appearances, and opting out isn’t really an option.

MM: Would you talk a little about the financial realities of the adjunct teaching game, especially in the face of $60,000 tuitions and annual increases?

BA: Here’s the adjuncting dilemma in a nutshell: a prestigious school tells you that you can join its faculty, teach its students and puts its hallowed name on your resume. The only rub is they’re going to pay you less for the semester than you’d get for writing a magazine article. That is, if you can actually score an assignment. So between the teaching itself, which can be incredibly rewarding, and the promise of a regular (if meager) paycheck, it’s hard to say “no.” Students don’t really pay attention to whether your adjunct or full-time faculty; to them, even if you’re making less for the semester than they get in allowance every month, you’re still the prof.

MM: The climax of the memoir involves you showing your live-in girlfriend Eliza a hidden cache of bills. I have nightmares about that very scenario. It’s a very naked moment. But a lot of the book is about the impact of money issues on relationships. How difficult was this scene to write? How did you decide it was time to push through the shame and share these troubles, with her and ultimately with us?

BA: It was an incredibly important step in learning how to stop being “Too Good to Be True” and just be true instead. So I knew that showing Eliza the cache of bills would have to play a climactic role once I started thinking about how to structure the memoir. As hard as it was at the time, there were even more cringe-inducing events involving money that I ended up leaving out of the book—I’m thinking of one birthday in particular when I made a big deal of taking Eliza out to the River Cafe, and the night before a couple of checks cleared and I didn’t have any money. You can’t just chalk it all up to recklessness and stupidity; I really was trying to sustain an image of myself that I couldn’t afford any longer.

MM: You take a job as a fact-checker at the end of the memoir and you seem to take comfort in the more banal office details: the building, the elevator, the lights. I know when you are un- or underemployed there is often a sort of fog of bemusement. Who works in all these huge buildings? How did they get these jobs? How much of a relief was this job and are you still fact-checking?

BA: I was fact-checking right up to the end of August, when I started an appointment as a visiting faculty member at Bennington College. It did seem like a sort of dream to be in that office tower, after struggling for so long and sending out so many resumes; I had a photo ID, a cubicle of my own, colleagues I really liked, favorite cashiers in the company cafeteria. Other than all of the sitting, which really made me miserable, I loved the fact-checking job. I wrote from 5AM most mornings until 8 or 8:30, then I donned my office garb and waded into the daily warfare of the subway platform at rush hour. I felt connected to the other commuters, no matter how bipolar they were or toxic. The consolations of an office job are real and profound.

Benjamin Anastas is the author of the novels An Underachiever’s Diary and The Faithful Narrative of a Pastor’s Disappearance (FSG), which was a New York Times notable book. Other work has appeared in The Paris Review, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, Bookforum, Men’s Vogue, The Yale Review and The Best American Essays 2012. He is a visiting faculty member at Bennington College and also teaches creative writing at Columbia University.

Michael McGrath tweets as @marcomcgrath.