A Frightenting Future of Financial Failure

I don't know that I've ever been as scared about the future as I was today.

I'm enrolled in Personal Financial Management over in the business building. This is a huge stretch of my personal comfort. First, I'm in a class that's about concrete business concepts rather than interpretations of various author's stories and poems. That in itself will stretch me--I'm not very business minded. Second, I have to step out of my free-thinking, future Beatnik, pseudo-hippie heaven (Kimpel Hall) into a place that is a Frat Boy/Sorority Girl, future investment-banker, yuppie Hell (Walton College of Business). I think I felt more comfortable when I stepped off the airplane in Turkey then when I walked into the WCOB on Wednesday.

Now, throw all this personal discomfort aside, because I feel like this class is going to change my life forever. Step one to a changed-life is our first assignment in class--keep a record of EVERY PENNY that I spend this semester (and how it is spent of course). It'll be tough, but it can be done.

Now, to my point. I was scared stupid this morning in class. Our professor started talking about retirement and saving for retirement. Basically, I think I'm either going to have to work until I die or starve to death during my retirement. That's the only options. Hopefully, I'll get a job as a professor someday. Then, I'll be able to work until I die. I mean, Dr. Montgomery is somewhere near a hundred, and she still teaches. It's the only way. Seriously though, retirment scares me. I don't even know exactly what an IRA or a 401K is. I know nothing about the stock market. I don't really do well at saving money. Hopefully, God will bless me with wonderful children that will one day support me in my old age. That, or I could learn how to budget and save and invest well. Hey, I wonder if they offer some sort of class about that?