How to Be Good at Being Grown Up: Ep. 2

Yesterday an insurance salesman came to our house. Because I am a recent college grad and despite my vigorous attempts to insist that I understand finances, Mom said, "It would be a good idea for you to sit at the table with us and try to learn something."

(I also had to clean my bathroom.)

So, at about 2:15 exactly, in strides our insurance salesman, young, grinning -- sporting his class ring, well-coiffed, highlighted hair, and the boyish look of a high-school football champ. (He also turned out to be a jovial family guy who actually encouraged us to do what was best for us financially. A+, sir.) He dialogued comfortably with my parents, cracked jokes, apparently made lots of sense to them, and left us with generally happy feelings.

But the table-talk was an enormous personal disaster for Yours Truly.

Look. I've taken economics classes. I got A's in math. I graduated with a killer GPA and I understood Inception after only one viewing. But apart from a couple grade-school analogies that Mr. Insurance threw out for me in desperation, I understood about zero percent of what was said around that table that day. If you are a recent college grad, this may happen to you one day, too. And you, like me, will probably feel like this.

So, recent college grad, I've collected some ideas for what to do when the dreadful day of life insurance-purchasing comes. Fear not, here are eight failsafe ways of preventing yourself from looking like a complete dingo. You may learn nothing about life insurance, but you will look intelligent and that's all that matters in the real world.

1. Make cookies. This only works if you are a girl. But if you have cookies and lemonade prepared (and a pleasing presentation), most people won't notice much of anything.

2. Smile a lot with eye contact. It makes you seem charming which makes you seem engaged which makes you seem smart. This also may work better if you're a girl.

3. Nod regularly.

4. Ask lots of really generic questions that don't really apply but make you seem engaged, like, "So if I died tomorrow . . . . [significant trail off] . . . ?"

5. Write stuff down. A short year of journalism has taught me the invaluable lesson that if you have a notebook and are scribbling frantically in it, people think you know what you're doing. And they are intimidated. (Good.) Feel free to simply doodle whimsically across the page. Just guard and hide it carefully like it's your family's financial statement or something. (Do people hide those? Whatever.) Combine this with #4 for maximum effect, as follows: "Right, so could you explain the ROTH IRA one more time? I'm definitely interested in pursuing that and I want to write it down."

6. Use words like "pursuing," "researched," "funds," "analysis," "crunch," "numbers," etc.

7. Mention your accountant friends if you have any. Example: "Yesterday I was having wine with an accountant friend of mine and he said...." (At this point, you should be thinking about getting one.)

8. Above all never, never, never, never, never ever let on that you are as clueless as you are. God forbid they think they have something to teach you.

As I did NOT follow any of these tips very faithfully and as my parents RATTED ME OUT ("Oh, Hannah's going to just sit here because she wants to learn how all this works!"), I was forced to learn about life insurance. I also learned, through a deft word-picture by Mr. Life Insurance, the difference between stocks and mutual funds. A stock is like one broken pencil. Mutual funds are like one broken pencil in the middle of a bundle of unbroken pencils. Life-enriching stuff there.

Till next time.