This is a very thoughtful piece.
In high school, I worked after class and on weekends. Labor laws were broken, as I worked 35 hours a week while in school at sixteen years of age. My parents financial situation was such that they would ask me for money to help cover bills or the mortgage. I gave them many thousands of dollars over the co…
In high school, I worked after class and on weekends. Labor laws were broken, as I worked 35 hours a week while in school at sixteen years of age. My parents financial situation was such that they would ask me for money to help cover bills or the mortgage. I gave them many thousands of dollars over the course of several years. The humiliation of having to ask their teenage son for money was met with my begrudging acquiescence. My asking, “How much this time?” or, “Will you be able to pay me back?” was an intentional twist of the knife to punish them for what I perceived as an injustice. They were preemptively defensive when asking and I saw that as being ungrateful. It was a tense period.
I wish I would have handled it better, but I was an angry teenager for a host of other reasons. In our case, scarcity amplified our other problems.
This is a very thoughtful piece.
In high school, I worked after class and on weekends. Labor laws were broken, as I worked 35 hours a week while in school at sixteen years of age. My parents financial situation was such that they would ask me for money to help cover bills or the mortgage. I gave them many thousands of dollars over the course of several years. The humiliation of having to ask their teenage son for money was met with my begrudging acquiescence. My asking, “How much this time?” or, “Will you be able to pay me back?” was an intentional twist of the knife to punish them for what I perceived as an injustice. They were preemptively defensive when asking and I saw that as being ungrateful. It was a tense period.
I wish I would have handled it better, but I was an angry teenager for a host of other reasons. In our case, scarcity amplified our other problems.