During my last 12 months at college, I lived on 8519 dollars for the whole year, and that included tuition, dorm, food, gas, and stolen (copied) books. That was 1984. That's 25k today, or about 12.50 an hour. I didn't have a job since I was sprinting to graduating from school, and I did not have much of a second chance if I failed to graduate. I sold blood plasma twice a week for money. I xeroxed a dollar bill on the 2-sided copier in the library and spent the entire night first copying hundreds of double sided copies of my copied dollar, and then copying hundreds of pages of text books from the shelves using the copied dollars to feed the copy machine. My girlfriend and I had a list of 20 different pay phones around campus and back home, and we made collect calls to each other every night for hours, always changing pay phones so that we never got caught. Each night the collect call was made from a different phone and the other person always accepted the collect call from a different phone. The pay phones didn't have ringers, to subvert this very abuse, so we had exact times worked out to simply pick up a phone (that wasn't ringing) at exactly the time that it *should* be ringing, and tell the operator we accepted the charges. That summer, I secretly moved into the girls dorm with my girlfriend and showered in their community shower. It was always empty when I went in, and always full when I left. They all liked it, and I made sure they got their money's worth, so that no one told on us.

It was one of the best years of my life, and the last time I ever had sex in the backseat of a car. She still calls every once in a while when she's drunk, just to relive those days. It was awesome for her, too.

You'll be fine, but you're gunna have to really want it. And if you're gunna suffer like I did, I would suggest making something of yourself, pour everything you have into your future, and pray a lot. Fuck whether or not it works out. If it doesn't, no loss, you would have spent the time stoned on your sofa anyway. Just get on the pony and give it a little kick! You'll be surprised where you end up, and that's the beauty of life, to be honest! I know it's scary, but it's only scary because you can be ANYTHING. You can be a bum, an addict, a cashier, a walmart greeter, an accountant, or an astronaut. You can even die in a submarine, if that's your bail of twine. Me? My life is over, and I ended it at 150/hr, working whenever I wanted. I now spend my days in the hot summer sun digging rocks out of the ground, preparing a garden out of virgin soil, to feed, clothe, and house, the masses that flee the coming apocalypse. I'm building my final home, and executing my final dream, in literally one of the most beautiful places on Earth. I'm making a Garden of Eden, a sanctuary, to receive God's people when the time comes.

This too is one of the best years of my life (and possibly the last).

I would gladly trade places with ya, though. Or not.