Suze with her bestseller "YFB"
Ah, Suze Orman. Independent. Strong-minded. Sassy. Is it any wonder that I have been a fan for years? Her book “The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous, and Broke” changed my life. From the age of 21, I knew how to save for my future, raise my FICO score, and make intelligent financial decisions. It is because of Suze’s vision that I was able to quit my job and pursue my passions.
One of Suze’s strongest tennants is saving for retirement. You can never start too early! Because I was somehow brought to Suze at an early age, I contributed to my retirement starting with my first job out of college. I never knew a paycheck that didn’t have pre-tax dollars removed and locked away from my greedy hands until I hit the age of 59 1/2.
After leaving my recent job, my retirement became fully vested, and I had some decisions to make. If you don’t know what “Fully-Vested” means btw, go to Amazon.com RIGHT NOW and purchase her book. Anwho, having two accounts with two separate financial institutions, I had to either rollover the money into one account or open up a separate IRA that I could later contribute to.
Because I’ve decided to go freelance (insert deep sigh of relief here), it is important that I open an IRA that I can continue to contribute to. This was thus added to the Life To Do List. And as soon as the money was dispersed to me, I went to BofA!! I may now cross off #43: Open up an IRA, contribute to it.
It’s important to know that the entire process took only about 20 minutes. I simply had to show up with the check made out to BofA, for benefit of myself, and then sign some papers. You can open an IRA for as little as $50!
Olga and I pose for a picture
Because I have a life that thrives on fun side stories, I must also include in this blog a little about Olga. She was the personal finance specialist that I worked with to open my IRA at Bank of America. Little. Russian. Unassuming. The opposite of Suze Orman, really.
She shared with us that her crowning achievement over the past month was receiving enough employee points for good work that she was able to cash in and get herself an iPod Touch! She barely knew how to use the device and struggled between “stone woman” and “cave age” (we obliged her request for language assistance and informed her that in fact the terms are “Cave Woman” and “Stone Age.”) I wanted to pinch her cheeks.
When she began to share that she was frustrated that the shuffle apparently does not come with a camera, we encouraged her to buy her own camera. She quickly scoffed and said… “I have camera, I scubadive! I have underwater camera!” I’m sorry? Wait… did you say scubadive? Little unassuming cave-age stone-woman Olga swam with sharks and eels? She jumped at the opportunity to fuel our surprise and offered to show us her pictures and clips from her recent dives in Cozumel, Mexico. On her fancy iPod Touch, of course. We agreed readily because… how can you resist that little face? And it’s little moments like this that make for good stories and memories… and blogging.
I was reminded to never judge a book by its cover. Unless it’s “The Money Book for the Young Fabulous and Broke” by Suze Orman… in which case, the title and smiley happy Suze face is enough to get me to turn to page one.
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Janelle K. Eagle is infamous for always having her hands tied up in multiple projects simultaneously. She's directed a lot of theater, worked on some films, and raised lots of money for non-profits. She travels all the time and loves to share her videos, photography and writing via this blog. 
