I Couldn't Risk Graduation

MY HOUSEMATE just got a job. Her immediate cause of jubilation was not her salary though, or her three weeks' paid vacation. "I got dental!" she exclaimed.

Seeing that my diploma would be more of a liability than an asset, I took

an incomplete in one of my courses, had my name pulled from the graduation program, and received a blank sheet of paper as I walked with my class.

A few weeks before graduation I realized that I too would meet this fate. I scrambled to get my eyes and teeth checked before June 13. But I wasn't the only one trying to beat the deadline; all the appointments were booked. I had no time to go to doctors and dentists at home. I would be stranded without insurance to cover any work that needed to be done. And I was planning on spending the summer working, uninsured, on a farm. The farmer tried to reassure me. "If you get in an accident you get workers comp!" she said. But I doubted that the insurance company would have my cavities filled just because I told them I chewed too much organic produce.

It was a professor who, unwittingly, offered me a solution. Earlier in the term she had offered to give me an incomplete so that I wouldn't grind myself into the ground during my senior spring. At first I refused her offer; then I began to see its advantages. I could either graduate on time or have medical benefits. I chose the benefits. Taking the incomplete, I had my name pulled from the graduation program. I smiled as I walked up to the platform on graduation and was handed my blank "diploma."

"Thanks, but I didn't really graduate," I told people who came up to congratulate me. To some I admitted that the reason was my teeth and eyes. "That's really lame, Suzanne," said one of my environmental studies professors. Easy for him to say; he just got tenure, health benefits and all.

Recent graduates were more understanding. "I wish I had thought of that," said a '91 who racked up more than $1,000 in debt when he broke his thumb two weeks after earning his degree. Another friend told me he might abandon a music career and opt either for a fulltime job or law school. "My insurance policy is about to end," he explained sadly.

Indeed, graduates who dream unconventional dreams—of performing, writing, farming, rockclimbing are finding that the risk of crippling debt makes their choices

tougher than ever. It's more than a matter of living with less; they're gambling their futures.

Obviously, there are people far worse off than we twenty-somethings. For one thing, most of my friends and I are healthy. But it's frightening to see the strange effects that a national policy—or the lack of it—can have on our lives.

It all worked out in the end for me. After Xrays and eye tests I finished my course and got my diploma. "Congratulations," my professor said. "Now you can afford to graduate."

SUZANNE SPENCER graduated with high honors in history and a certificate in environmental studies. She's stillwithout insurance.