I wrote a check to my boyfriend last night. I've been living with him about a month now, between leases. He's never asked me for rent, utilities or grocery money, probably because he knows that my job pays peanuts and I have pretty much no savings. (And he makes considerably more than I do.)
When we started dating, I didn't even like him buying my movie tickets. I paid for dinner at least some of the time. I did a little modeling, I had the money. However, some months later, I had some new expenses and no modeling. I got a part-time job, but there was a point waiting for my first pay check when I totalled up what I had, and counted the days on the calendar, and if my milk didn't go bad and if I made two meals out of every package of instant noodles, I would still run out of food three days before my first pay check. He never said anything about it, but he took me out to dinner more often, made me dinner at his place and sent me home with the leftovers, and took me to eat with his parents -- extending my inadequate food supply until I got paid.
I was grateful, still am grateful, I just hate feeling like a goddamn mooch. A lot of my family are the types to never pay back money, and while I do believe if you lend someone $20 and never see him/her again, it's money well spent, it's shameful to be that person. I hate being that person.
I started a new job yesterday, one that pays in real money instead of "valuable experience." I'm hoping I'll be able to pad my savings, but I also hope to start paying a little rent — chipping in even though I can't pay a fair share.
Student loans, on the other hand, do require to be paid in full, and it's more stressful than shameful when you have difficulties with that.
