Feb 22 2009
Never Let A Hairstylist Be Your Accountant
Yesterday at the beauty shop, the stylist was chatting to me about places he’d lived. It turned out that he knew the man who bought the gorgeous old country house at the corner of my brother’s street. His friend had bought it for a song.
Then he brought up the housing slump. He suggested that if someone’s mortgage is for $135K but the house’s value drops, then the bank should be forced to RENEGOTIATE the mortgage amount “or at least the rate”.
My jaw dropped. I used the analogy of someone I knew who stopped making truck payments. He had wanted a very expensive truck, so he took out a loan. A few years later, an unlicensed and uninsured driver struck his vehicle. The insurance paid the value of the vehicle, which didn’t equal the truck’s original worth. So he stopped paying – “reasoning” that since his truck was no longer worth $30K or whatever ridiculous amount he’d bought it for, it wasn’t fair to make him pay.
I have no idea if the stylist changed his mind, as he moved the discussion to ridiculously big trucks.
After the fact, I know that what I should have said was, “So if your house goes up in the value, the bank should demand you pay more, right?” But I was too flabbergasted to come up with an obvious example like that.
The very idea of re-negotiating terms like that reminded me unpleasantly of the Pencil Situation. In my school, high school students are notorious for not having papers, writing utensils, etc. When I first started teaching there, I was slightly annoyed that young adults took no responsibility for such things. When a few individuals went into Helpless Victim Mode, I nearly lost my temper.
Helpless Victim: “If you can’t give me a pencil, then I’m not taking this test today.”
Me: ”If you don’t take this test today, you’ll get a zero. So you’ll just have to wait until one of your friends finishes.”
What really blew me away, though, was an incident last year with a young man (for lack of an audience-friendly worse term). I had lent him a brand-new pencil and, at the end of the class, he broke it into pieces and threw it away.
“Hey, that was a loan,” I said. “You owe me a new pencil.”
“What? It’s only a pencil,” he protested.
“Yes, and it was mine. You can pay me for a new one…”
“I’ll bring you one tomorrow.”
And he did. It was about the length of my pinky finger, and it was covered in bite marks. I protested. But he said with perfect seriousnes, “But it’s better than yours was. This pencil still writes, and that other one was broken.”
There, in a nutshell is What’s Wrong With the World.
When I was teaching I kept a supply of “supplies”. Kid didn’t have a pencil or pen they had to buy one from me. Of course, it was a private Catholic school and I had the support of the parents.
When I taught at a Catholic school, I did the same thing. But I was charging 25 cents, while another teacher charged $1, so suddenly other students were coming to see me!
At public school, I start each year with a “loaner jar” full of pens and pencils found in the hallways. The honor system was never perfect, a few students were squeamish about chewed-on utensils, and if it ran out, students had no qualms about interrupting.
The Student Council actually bought separate pen and pencil dispensers that they mounted on the wall near the office. Either one is 25 cents. I intend to start next year with no Loaner Jar.
The stylist is basically suggesting that the Obama stimulus plan be policy from here on out?
I’m sorry – I realize that this is a big nasty mess, and that it’s likely to get worse if we don’t do something. I get that it’s a snowball effect. And while I’m not convinced that the Obama plan is a good one, I don’t have a better suggestion right now.
But having it as a stopgap to mitigate the effects of a massive housing crisis, and adopting it as policy for normal times, are two entirely different animals.
I think I would’ve suggested that it was “only fair” to let me pay less for my haircut, claiming it had depreciated since we started the cut. (But after he had finished…) :-p
ha ha! Well, he DID take off more than 2 inches, but he only charged me $11 for cut and style. It’s really the best salon I’ve found around here, and it’s just down the road from a friend’s house and next to my favorite church.
Your readers may think I’m mean but I don’t typically lend out supplies. EVER.
I strongly believe that a 12, 13, and 14 year old can be REQUIRED to bring paper and pens to class.
If I make it available, then why should they have to bring them?
I like the idea of making them wait until someone else is done, Jean. What a valid, natural consequence.
If the student is one who is rarely unprepared or having a bad day etc. , I may slip him/her a pen but I find that it is usually the same children count on others to bail them out all of the time.
Gee…wonder how that could manifest later in life?
[...] on the other hand…not so uplifting, but at least it lets you know you’re not [...]
Some retired teachers told me they used to supply each student a pencil and/or pen at the beginning of the school year. That way they were making sure that their low-income students had basic supplies without drawing attention to them.
I have a collection of used binders, folders, etc. that I make available for students who need something at the beginning of each semester.
My district tended to supply a lot of things, possibly because times were good in the ’90s. A recent development was in February when my district stopped supplying tissues for all the (literally) snot-nosed students.
Immediately my seniors and juniors started offering to bring boxes in – for extra credit. I suggested gently that adults carry their own, so they may as well get used to it now. I didn’t want to have one of those classes that the kids brag about passing: They fail almost everything but make up points with school supplies!