High Cost Of Education

With this 2011 to 2012 school year, our 14year-old daughter entered high school. At the insistence of her mother, she had been attending a small, private parochial school. Despite the financial hardship of having just put our 22year-old son through four years at the University of San Francisco, my wife still wanted our daughter to attend a private parochial high school. Although a product of public schools, I have zero problem with doing that.

Initially there was one caveat: All her middle school friends were going to a different high school. That meant that she wouldn’t know anyone and she was quite vocal about this concern. Social butterfly that she is, she had a bunch of new friends after just the first day of school, boys included, as this is a coed school. My wife and I were happy that she made new friends, and encouraged her to socialize with them through her other activities like cheerleading.

On one of the first weekends, she was going to meet up with four of the girls from cheerleading at the movies. My wife and I gladly volunteered to drop her off, as we wanted to meet her new friends. I even offered to treat everyone. When I made the offer, I didn’t realize it was a 3-D movie, which is 10 bucks a pop. After the concession stand, what I spent probably would have made a good down payment on a Toyota Prius.

Before they entered the movie, our daughter asked if we would be able to give two of the girls a ride home. “Of course,” I replied. After the movie it came time to get the girls home, it was only then that I found out that one girl lives in Kaaawa and the other in Makakilo. An hour and a half later, both girls were home. My gas tank nearly empty, our daughter said, “Dad, I hope you remember where these guys live as we have to pick them up next weekend.”

With premium gas still above 4 bucks a gallon, I looked at my wife and said, “I hope you’re happy, private school girl.”