Am I the only one who thinks this cannot end well?

So. If I could get my prescription to stop getting worse each year, I would be all about Lasik Eye Surgery. I know a handful of people who’ve gotten it, all with rave reviews of waking up and being able to see, taking a shower and being able to see, getting up in the middle of the night without fishing for your glasses on the nightstand.

Recently, the people at Lasik e-mailed me to point out even more benefits: financial savings. (Just imagine how much money I’d save by not ever again buying disposable lenses, new glasses, contact solution, etc.) If you want to check out more information, go to iLASIK.com, which answers tons of questions about the procedure.

Also, if you’ve had the procedure done, I’d love to hear what you think about it!

He’s been on my mind lately. When I met him, we were 19 and 20, so young and so inexperienced at everything. Though I didn’t have debt, I’d also never done anything by myself: I hadn’t supported myself financially. I hadn’t lived within a budget. I didn’t even know how much most things—beyond food and clothing—cost. The thought of connecting myself only to one person seemed like prison. And I didn’t want to be with him. He wasn’t for me. No one could tell me that he was. Why did they think they could tell me that? So I pushed him away and then I let him slip out of my life.

With 26-year-old eyes, things look different now. I look back and think he was a good, kind man who cared about me and who would’ve done anything for me. I think we were passionate about the same things. I think I hurt him very much, and, even though I apologized and meant it, even though he forgave me, things can never be the same. I think I gave up something good, most of all a true friend.

Maybe everyone does things they could look back on and regret. And while not all necessarily financial, these things affect who we become and shape us and, probably by extension, even the money decisions we made.

After that relationship really ended, when neither of us cared enough to send an e-mail from different states, I started to grow up. I got my first job. I met new people. I published my first article. Later, I went back to school, which led to a better job, more articles, more money, a level of independence. And with the eyes of someone who’s done the rejecting and who’s been given very much, I took a lot of these things for granted. It was horrible when I went on a date with someone who didn’t like me. It was earth-shaking when someone I work with told me off for treating him the way I’d been used to treating people. I started to see what it felt like, started to understand what I’d put this other guy through.

And, from what I gather, he grew up, too. I message him on Facebook every now and then. I did last week. He’s always polite, kind even, when he responds. It’s just different now. We both grew up, but too late for each other.

Then, last week, I was trying to sell my brother’s old camera for him. The day the sale closed, I sent an invoice to the winner. Two days later, she said not to worry, the money would be sent in three days. I waited. Then, she e-mailed me again to say she had changed her mind and didn’t want the camera anymore. She asked if I could do a second chance offer and she’d pay the difference. The second chance offer didn’t pan out either, and now the original buyer won’t respond to my e-mails. so annoying, I can’t even tell you. I will file another complaint, but apparently eBay doesn’t take this stuff too seriously. Where is the incentive for a buyer not to just bid away and change his or her mind?

What with all the sour news lately, though, I had sort of put that off on the back burner. Then my dad, hearing about the newest Macbooks, mentioned that maybe the company could buy me one, like they did with my cell phone. I said maybe I could pay for half.

This is where I should insert another caveat about my dad’s being the nicest, most giving person and just admit here and now that I must be spoiled rotten. Last weekend, while we celebrated a birthday and an anniversary in the family, neither mine, Dad surprised me with a brand-new, silver, shiny Macbook. It’s wonderful, and he’s the nicest person ever.

So scratch that off my goals.

The biggest change this is causing for me right now, financially, is that my budgeting system needs to be completely different. I had been using budget by snowmint, but the version I had only works with PCs. Buying the Mac version is another $30 or $40, and then I risk losing it all over again if I want to switch computers. Since I’ve been using Mint.com for a while, I’ve decided to start using it for my budgeting as well. We’ll see how this goes.

Take this week, for example:

Yesterday, because of a smallish mistake a restaurant made on my order, I and my co-workers ate lunch for free (!). This, I’ll just tell you, was enough to make me grin from ear to ear, while exclaiming how nice this restaurant is! such good customer service! what a wonderful manager! I even wrote a letter to the company’s headquarters, just because I was feeling so positively pleased.

But that was yesterday. Today, a colleague I have come to greatly dislike wrote me a nasty letter, which to me came out of nowhere and was based on presumptions. Trying to take the higher road, I apologized for what he accused me of, saying that wasn’t what I’d meant. I also mentioned, at the end, that using expletives when referring to people I work with (or me) probably wasn’t appropriate. The whole event got me in such a down mood, feeling so frustrated and irritated and wanting to get away from him, the office, anyone who reminds me of the incident in question.

And then, just as I’m high as a kite in my self-pity, I think of that really kind manager yesterday, who bent over backwards to help me and make me happy, at no real reward to himself really. And I remember how on-top-of-the-world everything was afterwards and feel a little embarrassed at how bottom-of-the-barrel I’ve become because of one (mean maybe) person.

What does this all have to do with personal finance? Well, aside from the not-paying-for-a-meal thing yesterday and the hey-I-still-have-a-job thing today, not a lot. Except to say that just because your stock portfolio or your career path or your 401K seem down today doesn’t mean they will tomorrow. And vice versa, I suppose.

I guess what I mean is: most everything’s temporary. And when you see things that way, there’s not a lot to worry about.

At work, I sit surrounded by large windows, with a huge tree just next to me that’s beginning to orange and matching, smaller trees at the buildings within view. It’s darker now, so I flip on my lamp. Volume is slower these days, thanks to the economy or the election or just life. There have been layoffs. Then more layoffs. Then the sad, sad voicemail at my desk one morning, from the receptionist I loved who raved about my baking. Chin up, she told me. She’ll be fine, she’ll keep working hard, she’ll get through this. I watch the pale blue sky while I work, sipping coffee, ready to bite into a freshly picked apple my co-worker gave to me.

By the end of the day, the sky will be gray. It’s happened sooner this year than last, before daylight saving time, before the end of October, before I had time to expect it. I will drive home in almost-dark, the sun night quite set, night on my mind. I will eat dinner, maybe go for a walk, maybe read a little, maybe blog for a bit, then go to sleep.

But there are a lot of us (just look around at PF blogs) who have been trying, really trying to do everything the right way. We’ve been saving instead of spending, investing instead of splurging, researching instead of just believing what we’re told. We don’t use credit cards to buy things we can’t afford, you know? I guess for as long as I’ve been trying to be smart with money, I’ve been operating under a very basic ideology: that people who work hard and invest and stay informed will come out ahead.

There are no sure things, I hear people saying these days. Remember the Depression. Remember world wars. Sometimes times will be tough, so you have to focus on the good things.

And I have been, or I’ve been trying to. But, forgive me: Should I feel bad for people who max out their credit cards on luxuries? Should I want to pay higher taxes for people whose eyes were bigger than their pocketbooks? Am I being unfair? Does anyone else feel the same way?

When in the world, seriously, did credit cards become a necessity? Can we try to justify them as one now? When did we decide that we have to have certain things?

I remind myself often that things are much more complicated than they seem from my small perspective. And there are a lot of people who weren’t given my privileges, education or exposure to financial information. But still, a nagging, persistent little voice says something’s not right.

Last night and today, I caught up on all your blogs and our terrible economy and what everyone thinks about the bailout and the election and the plunging stock market.

And I’m worn out, honestly. Wondering how in the world I can ever get back into the PF-blogging I love, that’s about real people with real budgets and dreams and financial struggles. I’m wondering how I can make things a little less like “12 Tips” and “4 Steps” and “6 Easy Secrets” and a little more like something I enjoy. I don’t blog for money (I make very little). I don’t blog for prestige (I’m anonymous). I [thought i] blog for fun. But somewhere along the line, blogging has become something I should do, something I feel like everyone else is doing better, something I can’t catch up with. And I don’t like it.

So I’m making a command decision. I am only going to blog here when I have something to say and when I want to. Enjoyment is, really, the only thing I’ve got going for this whole blog thing. So I’m going to start working towards it again.