Living Inside My Student Loan

My student loan payment and my rent payment are automatically withdrawn from my bank account exactly one day apart:  loan on the last day of the month, rent on the first.  I was just looking at the two charges, one on top of the other in my bank statement, and I noticed that with the recent increase in the prime rate, my loan payment is now only $8.61 less than my rent.

For my loan payment and the cost of two Starbucks grande frappucinos (java chip, please), I could pay my rent every month.  For ten bloody years.

If I could go back to pre-medical school me, the one who was about to abandon her natural frugality and embark on an eight-year-long spending spree, I would tell myself to smarten up.  You aren't a doctor yet.  Loans are hard to pay back.  Pack a lunch.

I feel the urge to say the same things every time I overhear medical students talking about buying a new car or going on an expensive vacation or paying for two first-class seats on a plane to bring home the wedding dress they bought in another city*.   

Smarten up.  Loans are hard to pay back.

*True story.  One seat for the bride, the other for the dress.