Women after 50: Laying awake at night

I have a student loan. It's a big one, which I refer to as my mortgage. Until I went back to school for the big degree, I was pretty much debt-free, except for my car, which I paid off early - twice.

For most of my life I cleared all of my debts at one point during the year. Sometimes it was in September. Sometimes in June. I always celebrated.

When I went back to school, I was tight-fisted with a buck - careful about spending money that wasn't really mine. One day I was talking with my program advisor about the cost of books. He said, "Give yourself permission to read. Reading and buying books and keeping up with the conversations and writing your response to them develops your thinking. You have to decide if you want to give yourself permission to read."

I've always been a reader - just not the kind that schools cultivate. I like to read trash and mysteries and the mystical books mentioned in Dan Brown's latest novel, "The Lost Symbol," which I'm reading now. My advisor was a good guy, so I bit on his advice. I started briefing myself more broadly than ever, and keeping up with the latest intellectual conversations about journalism, listening, writing, editing and life in general (the most fun stuff). That bit of wonder put me in deep credit card dept.

I've finally paid that off. It took years, in part because this bit of wonder led to international travel: Japan, Prague, islands in the South China Sea. It also stimulated my curiousity. Today I more easily take an interest in just about anything except violence. I'm much more sensitive to violent communication now.

Today's Huffington Post offers an article by Barbara Hannah Grufferman about what women fear the most after 50. Read it here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/barbara-hannah-grufferman/life-after-50-womens-wors_b_861659.html?ncid=wsc-huffpost-cards-image

She's right: Her survey is more revealing than observations found in many scholarly studies. When I went back to school, it was something long-dreamed of - a purely intellectual desire fulfilled - a selfish act of self-cultivation. I thought I'd teach, and tried that, but doing that in the United States put lines in my face and gave me indigestion. It was just sickening. Overseas, I was appreciated and treated with high regard and respect. I've heard the same from other university professors.

Grufferman's article says after 50 women lay awake at night wondering how they will support themselves when they are old. Many wonder if they will be homeless seniors. It seems plausible.

She cites compelling statistics and comments from women responding on Facebook and Twitter. Personally, I am in dept to my professors at the University of Maryland in College Park, National-Louis University formerly in Evanston, Illinois, and at Roosevelt University in Chicago. I lay awake wondering how I'm going to pay back my student loan - which is my mortgage.

And I think fondly on President Barack Obama, who created relief for women like me who bet on themselves with a pile of cash and hope and the faith that they would make good on their student loans. After 30 years, my loan will be forgiven even if the total has not been met.

Sometimes I wish I hadn't gone back to school, hadn't amassed so much debt. Sometimes. The debt pushes me into a new adventure, one I wouldn't pursue otherwise. That, too, is a gift.

Where would you be if it weren't for ???? I'm curious to know.