If you were near the Environmental Sciences and Technology building yesterday at about 10:07 a.m., there is a good chance that you heard a loud “thunk,” followed by lots of laughter. In fact, if you were near the entrance of the building, you may have seen the cause of the commotion: a woman had just walked smack into one of the window panels because she was looking at a shiny apple she was about to eat. She apparently didn’t notice that the window she hit wasn’t an open door.

I’ll admit that I laughed at her. I laughed at her hard.

But I couldn’t help but cry, either.

Because it really hurt when that window hit my nose. It still does, actually.

In the minutes after the third most embarrassing moment I’ve had since getting to college (the winner would have to be breaking my hand while hurdling a fire hydrant the first week of freshman year; close in second place is barfing at Starbucks because I was laughing too hard), I couldn’t help but think of what had just happened as a metaphor for something much bigger than my absent-mindedness.

If we take a look at our nation’s spending habits, for example, and those of average Americans, I think I can safely say that I’m not alone in suffering from extreme nearsightedness. Like anyone else with their ears or wallets open, I’ve been hearing financial thunks all around the country.

According to President Obama’s federal budget for the 2010 fiscal year, our national government will be spending $459 billion more than it will be receiving. By 2019, the administration expects to have a deficit of $8.98 trillion.

In other words, our country is and will be borrowing LOTS of money from other countries in order to be able to spend as it wishes. Indeed, the money we borrow to cover that $8.98 trillion deficit is going to have to be paid back, with interest. The president has estimated that our interest alone on our collected deficit will cost us $4.86 trillion in 2019.

Ouch. Talk about walking into a glass window. Paying for both of those is more like falling off a skyscraper. And when we hit bottom, I doubt we’ll be laughing at ourselves.

I’m no math expert, but doesn’t the solution seem simple? Can’t our government simply stop spending?

I like to think that it could, but the realist in me knows this isn’t possible. For if a government is by the people and for the people, then it reflects the people. And we the people are spenders.

At the end of 2008, Americans had $972 billion in credit card debt, according to the March 2009 Nilson Report. With this in mind, how can we ask our government, which is made of other Americans, to stop spending money it doesn’t have? It seems that we’re all avoiding the real issue in our criticism of our representatives: our spending selves.

I nearly broke my nose because I was looking at a shiny apple. My only hope is that when it comes to our money, we have the guts to look up before we take our next step. I’d like to think of our nation as more than a four-star klutz.