Skeleton In the Closet By Aongus Burke The grass is always greener, isn't it? When you're in college, it's easy to be jealous of those who are "real world" who don't have to constantly sweat over tests or papers. Once the work day is done, at least we have the entire evening to ourselves. Granted, life in the real world for Wesleyan graduates is probably less stressful than life at Wesleyan. Though some of my evenings and weekends are consumed with paying bills, doing dishes and cleaning my bathtub, I still have a lot more time to myself these days. So then why the hell have I been overloading myself with commitments lately? I suppose the answer begins by looking at the time tradeoff one makes upon entering the workforce. Time is strikingly flexible when you're in college. You only have to be in class a few hours a day in college and, if you're not in the mood, you can just blow it off. You may have a part-time job or some extracurricular activities that take up a considerable amount of time, but odds are you still have plenty of hours every day where you don't have anywhere in particular to be. On the other hand, the work never really seems finished. There's always reading to catch up on, a paper around the corner, a final that will make you pay for the time you spent slacking off. In the "real" world, things are a bit different. I know a preset number of hours each weekday are going to be devoted to work: waking up, getting dressed in suit and tie, taking the subway to work, working, taking the subway back home and changing my clothes. If I don't work any overtime, Aongus time begins on weekdays at about 6:30. I suppose I do have the whole weekend to myself, but then what happened to the four weeks I used to have off around Christmas? Under the circumstances, those hours I have to myself become precious and I try to make as much of them as I possibly can. But time is money, and in a city like New York it's especially expensive. Including overtime, I make around $37,000 a year. It's not a bad salary for someone in his first year out of college. I take home about $2,300 a month after taxes. As far as preset expenses go, I shell out $660 a month to share a 2-bedroom apartment on West 104th Street. Believe it or not, this is actually a steal. I know a couple of 1998 Wes grads who are splitting $1900 a month for a smaller place on East 6th Street. My neighborhood isn't as cool, but the extra $300 a month cushions the blow. Unfortunately, I don't really get to keep it, because I spend nearly that amount a month to pay off my college loans. Before college, everyone told me that loans would be a breeze to pay off, but I guess none of them went to colleges that make you take out the maximum Stafford and Perkins loans before dispensing any real aid. My first loan payment to the Stafford people was due on December 25th and it was for $210.05. Merry Christmas! Just 119 payments to go, and I get to tack on monthly $70 payments to the Perkins people come March. Add on my utility, phone, cable and subway charges and I'm usually left with over $1200 a month to feed, clothe and otherwise entertain myself. This probably seems like a lot of money to live on. So how is it that I've stopped saving money since I moved out of my parents' house five months ago? Because time really is money. Those few hours I have to myself each day are just too valuable to spend washing, ironing, and cooking. I just can't be bothered. At first this struck me as a snobby attitude; my dad thought so when I told him. Then it occurred to me that at least I was paying people to prepare my food and laundry; he had always just expected that his wife would do it. Unfortunately, my mother comes from a culture where those kinds of expectations are always met. The Upper West Side of Manhattan is a long way from the fishing towns of Galway, Ireland. Still, it's funny to note how central bars are to both places. And, as many of you might have guessed, it's in bars and clubs that people like me end up burning a substantial amount of money. After many a night spent paying outrageous cover charges and buying enough liquid courage to talk to that cute boy . . . well, it's easy enough to see where that $1200 goes. Does this constitute a bad lifestyle? Hardly. After four years of Gadamerian hermeneutics, symbolic interactionism and multivariable calculus, a life filled with fine ethnic cuisine, recreational drugs and casual sex doesn't seem so bad. Indeed, I have some friends who I think can find this life fulfilling indefinitely. They know how to spend money. They can go to a fancy restaurant, pick the right entree and wine and fully appreciate the experience. They can take advantage of all of the cultural opportunities a city like New York has to offer. And they know people in so many cities that when the need to get away strikes they can make the most of it. But for me and for a lot of others I think, this way of living gets real old real fast. The first few months I was at work, I'd often go out and catch up with an old friend over dinner. I'd tell him about work, or about moving into my new place, or whatever else was new in my life. But it became harder to make conversation with each subsequent dinner. There isn't much new and exciting going on in the workplace. So what else am I going to talk about? My adventures barhopping on Saturday nights? Sooner or later you have to reassess the way you spend your time. You have to add something that will at least make you an interesting person again. You could take up a hobby, do some volunteer work or just read a little bit more. I'd think less of my friends who are taking night classes if I weren't still writing for Hermes. It's easy to be nostalgic. But though you may spend all your time in college working or worrying about work, at least it's work that is generally challenging and stimulating, not brainless and mind-numbing. Maybe that's why doing your own laundry or cooking for yourself while you're at school isn't such a drag. But in the real world, those kinds of tasks become real nuisances, not merely pleasant breathers that prevent intellectual overload. Maybe that's why you have to pay to go to college.