I’ve been blessed with so much- a family that loves me, a good education, several opportunities. I never had more reason to be angry than my siblings being disagreeable or my parents denying me something I wanted. They were brief forays into anger. Just enough to recognize what angry felt like, how destructive and stupid it made me.

Anger tasted like iron and heat. I clenched and fumed. I raged and screamed. And sometimes, anger was hot tears. Anger was my mother throwing a chair into the storage door and leaving a dent. Anger was my father throwing papers and cats and fits. Anger was despair and hopelessness, collapsing on my floor with my feet blocking the doorway.

Most importantly, anger was fleeting. Iron cooled, fumes ran out, screams ended, dents were fixed, apologies were said, forgiveness was offered, hope returned, and the door opened again.

I never felt lasting anger, permanent anger until this year. It started gradually, until it suddenly burst like a cyst breaking skin for the first time. And I drain, but it just refills and bursts again. And its roots reach deep into the past.

Growing up, I never understood the concepts of money, time, and especially the future. Planning for the future seemed so removed from myself that immediate concerns always overrode any calls to prepare.

Cue my senior year of high school. I was 1.5 credits away from graduating when I started my senior year. I decided to take fun classes and finally spend some time in the art department outside of the choir room. I was about halfway through the first semester when I was called to the counselor’s office to discuss “my future”. What that meant, I wasn’t sure. She asked me if I was going to college and I think I shrugged. I hadn’t thought about it at all. Everyone in the “AP track” was encouraged to go to college. I was told I could get scholarships, I’d just need to apply! And I could go to school and there were statistics about how much more money I’d make as a college graduate.

My parents came in to see the counselor with me and my dad saw a poster for the University of Wyoming tour. He said he’d gone to their stadium for games when he was younger. I should go on the tour!

So I signed up.

I went on the tour and learned that I would qualify for the Honors Program based on my GPA and SAT score. I was told about scholarships, fed from the cafeteria, and walked around the campus. I answered a question correctly and got a men’s XL shirt for my troubles, which was way too big, but appealed to my love for free stuff.

So I signed up.

I didn’t want to start as an “Undecided” because it ironically felt wrong to start college without knowing what you wanted to study, so I found the first thing in the dropdown that appealed- “Anthropology”. I was watching Bones at the time and Dr. Brennan was a forensic anthropologist, so it had to be cool, right?

So I signed up.

My parents bought me a book about finding scholarships and starting college. Dad had gone to university for three years after high school for geology, but he dropped out. I still haven’t asked why he didn’t finish that last year. Mom never thought about university as an option- she didn’t think it was an option. Neither knew how to help me apply for scholarships. dad would joke about how I should have been a redheaded, lefthanded tennis player because he knew about a scholarship for that… I found scholarships online and I applied. I applied. I applied.

Nothing. And then August came and it came down to applying for loans. There was no other way to pay for it, and I turned to my parents. They said, get a job, help pay for school, and we’ll sign up for the loans.

So I signed up.

My mom bore the brunt of the loans because with my lack of credit history, there was only so much they would approve each semester. And loan after loan, semester after semester, I eventually graduated with a BA in English, Honors Program with minors in Professional Writing and Creative Writing. A far cry from Anthropology, but mind-opening and just a blast. I loved each class and I grew so much as a person and as an academic.

Cue post-graduation job applications. I’m excited! I have a degree, so now I’ll start making money! No more need for fast food or retail jobs! I applied for writing jobs. I interviewed, I applied, I applied, I applied.

And then I started working with my mom again. Receptionist.

Receptionist. A more soul-sucking job I can’t imagine. I was good. My bosses loved me, my coworkers liked me, and the patients liked me. I was good. And I hated every minute of it. And I started paying on my loans. The smallest amount possible, because I was paying for a lot of things now and because of my lack of experience, and the low-paying nature of being a receptionist, I couldn’t afford much.

God pulls me to volunteer for a mission- 18 months in Mexico. I put my loans on hold. 18 months of humbling, spiritual, and social experiences later, I’m back in the states with a new language and a new passion for latino culture. I was more myself than I’d ever been. It was bliss.

Receptionist. I go back temporarily as a favor to an old boss who was looking for help. I needed to work, so I was happy to accept on the understanding that it would be temporary! I got the office going again and trained a replacement. I started paying on my loans again, and somehow they seemed bigger than ever. I went down to part-time to write more. I made a website, started assembling a portfolio of what I had made as a receptionist, like manuals and signs and patient handouts. I started applying for writing jobs again. I applied. I applied. I interviewed. I applied.

Receptionist. I found a new fulltime position working with my mom again. This office was a blessing. I loved my coworkers, I loved the patients, I loved everything but that terrible front desk, especially that *adjective redacted* phone.

My loans are blessedly put on hold and I can afford my first beat-up car. A truck. I love it! And I didn’t write for two years. I tried. Nothing came out. I had given up. We closed for COVID and everyone said I had to be enjoying my writing time, but nothing came out except blank screens, blank pages, and blank ideas.

A year into the new job, I escaped the front desk and became a lab monkey. I enjoy my corner of the office, hidden away in my corner. But it isn’t enough. I have vacation pay for the first time in a while. My loans are still on hold, so when my truck break down, I buy a fuel-efficient, fun, awesome car. Prices skyrocket on everything from fuel to daily essentials. Inflation hits me hard. I can’t pay the bills with my job. Even fulltime, it isn’t enough to afford car insurance, car repairs, food. The list goes on. And then student loans threaten their head.

My minimal loans have seemingly tripled in size and my income has not increased accordingly. So I looked for additional work. I applied, I applied, I applied.

Nothing.

So, I looked for a different job to replace the one I have. I applied, I applied, I applied.

I had an interview at a middle school to be a teacher, but leaving I knew there was no possibility of a hire because of my lack of experience. They’d have to give me a mentor and a lot of hand-holding, so no matter how well my sample lesson was (and they said it was faultless), I knew there was nothing for me to do at the moment. Apply for a substitute teacher job, they said. Then after a while we could maybe hire you fulltime. How could that pay my bills if I can’t guarantee work?

I enjoy my job and I come home without energy to even eat dinner. My room is a mess, the yard is unkept. I can’t bring myself to look at my credit card accounts. My car keeps needing repairs that I can’t possibly afford. I sometimes sleep for 14 hours or more just to escape from life. I feel like I can never go out to do something because I don’t have money, and I hate when people pay for me to do things. I feel like a leech, and I barely take care of myself. Most of the time, I stay up until the next day, hoping that maybe I’ll just not have to wake up in the morning.

So I give up. I’m just raging inside and going further and further into debt. And I can’t see a way out except working multiple jobs for the foreseeable future and even then, I’m not sure how long I could possibly last.

I am angry because I didn’t understand what I was getting into. I’m angry because of a system that pumps out educated but inexperienced graduates and lets them loose to never use their degrees and waste away in the jobs that aren’t designed to pay enough to pay off school loans. I’m angry that the best jobs I have ever gotten have been because of who I know instead of what I know. I’m angry that it doesn’t matter how educated or eloquent or worthy I am for a job because I don’t have experience. I’m angry that I don’t have the energy to continue applying for jobs. I’m angry that I don’t have the resources to see a counselor or a therapist to figure anything out. I’m angry at the lack of opportunity I have to use my degree. I’m angry at how unprepared I was for the reality of loans and the lack of job availability. I’m angry because I can’t answer my real question:

What is the point of a university education and why was I funneled into it?

I can answer it, but only cynically. It is because the system feeds off of underprivileged kids who mortgage away their lives for a lie. I can only imagine how it is for those with less money, less opportunity, less good luck. And I’m angry that if you never meet the people that you need to meet at the universities where we are educated to enter the workplace, then only the people who were born into a circumstance to meet those people already are going to succeed. And thus, it doesn’t matter what you study, it only matters who you meet, and who you impress.

My anger only triples when I learn about another young woman paying for her education through the sex trade. What kind of world is it when the most viable option for women to pay for their education is through the sexual gratification of someone else? And I am even more angry that I have considered joining their ranks. Because I just don’t have the energy to work more than I do and to apply for jobs more than I do.

And why do we have to pay back worthless student loans? Why is it that we can’t abolish them completely? Whoever has been profiting on the exploitation of students surely has made enough money. I understand not wanting to pay for everyone’s education, especially if you’ve already paid for your own and your children’s. So why should they have to pay? Why can’t we simply say, “you can’t make money from the exploitative loaning for an education.” They’ll fuss, but that’s the vast minority. And they’re the wealthy minority. I’m sure they can find some other ethical gray area where they can infest (no, sorry I meant invest.) and make bank. We shut down loan sharks and bookies and illegal drug sellers. Why not these people? Don’t pay them from the federal government’s beyond-empty wallet. Just declare it illegal- not prosecutable for past offences, simply illegal moving forward. And voila- they can’t collect from former students, they keep whatever money they made, and we keep a little bit of our money to actually have hope in the future.

Is my solution perfect? No. But it makes more sense than whining about it for years and failing to do more than put off the inevitable crash when student loans require payment again right during inflation and potential economic crash. And more people would survive if they didn’t have loans weighing them down to the dust.

I know I’ll scrape off the dust and figure something out. I’ll survive somehow, but that anger feels like it is here to stay. That anger burns continually. And I don’t think it’s going out.