Debt Dilemma

My life right now is a waiting game.  Waiting to hear back from schools to then decide where I'm going to spend the next three years.  Once we know, we can plan the next stage of our life.  We are thinking more and more it will be back in the Bay Area, as I've been accepted to California College of the Arts in SF.  A fantastic school with an awesome architecture program.  I should be ecstatic!  Why am I not?  Well, its a private art school that will run me a little over 30 K a year for 3 years... that's 3 times 30...equals a whole lotta dough, and a lot of interest to boot!

So I'm consumed with weighing the options of that being my best shot (if Berkeley doesn't come through... what's taking them so long!!) and wondering if its wise to go for it, damn the debt, and work my ass off afterwards to eternally pay it back.  I mean, that's the American way no?  The price I have to pay for quality education and the chance to move ahead in life.  Now, in a perfect world where the economy isn't tanking and I don't lie awake at night thinking the free market system is finally crashing and I should concentrate on growing food and building a home for the long term goal of sustainable old age, I think maybe the future is nothing but rainbows and high-paying commissions for sustainable architecture, and I'd have no dilemma at all.  But we all know that's not the case and the future is tentative at best.  Now, 3 years from now, this current crisis could all be a distant memory, or if history is our teacher, forgotten altogether, and we'll be on to the next bubble of business and profit$.  In that case, I should definitely go for it!

I know a lot of you are reading this thinking: Hell, I have waaaay more debt than this guy, and I'm making it.  House, car, school, saving for kid's school, etc.  Suck it up!  Join the club and get on with it.  OK, admittedly I've long lived with a philosophy that big debt is bad and the current form of slavery, or at least indentured servitude, and Jen has never had debt and we enjoy a certain freedom because of it.  What is lost and what is gained from debt?  From the living today on the hopes of tomorrow's earnings.  A scary time to do the math, I know, and no one (including and especially those in charge) know what the hell the world will look like in 3 or 5 years.  Do you?  If you are reading this, please comment and tell me your opinion, any advice, or your experiences living with/under/through indebtedness.  Roll the dice with me...

Casey