While growing up you learn a lot from your parents and failures. But, only once you realize what you were taught, it may be to late or you may say “Damn he was right”. When you were young, how many times did you hear your parents keep telling you that you’ll know what they are talking about when you get older, and you always think, what they hell is this old prune talking about. However, graduating from college next spring quarter, and having turned 22 in January, I have had a lot to think about. I remember friends that graduated last year keep telling me that they have ‘sort of’ anxiety about what they are going to do, that is, their life after college.
Now in their position a year later, I now have the honor of possessing their once anxiety. I think a lot about what I’m going to do next year and what my life is going to be like in 10 years. Am I going to be happily married with my family of my own? I hope so. People may say that life is all layed out, and fate is going to run its course. However, what makes life so hard is that you don’t know your own fate.
One thing I do realize while looking back at my childhood and teen years, is that my parents did a good job raising me. While attending UCSB I have seen almost everything, that is, immature kids and young adults. Yes, there are young responsible adults attending UCSB. We know how to work hard and play hard. The point I’m trying to get to, is that, I’m glad on how I was brought up.
I come to college and you see kids living off of daddy’s and mommy’s money, not knowing how to be responsible financially. When I was growing up I didn’t get an ‘allowance’, I had to work for anything and everything I had, whether it be cleaning the bathrooms, mopping the floor, doing the dishes every night, and vacuuming for 10 dollars every 2 weeks. Damn what a rip off right? But, what I learned was to work hard to get what you want. Most if not all of my money was saved up, however, when me and my brother wanted something such as a new video game or baseball cards, we would eventually (not willingly) let go of our hard earned cash. This also taught me to respect things a lot more than others. Things cost money, and you shouldn’t be tossing things around and disrespecting your hard earned work. When you pay for things with your OWN money, you learn take care of things and keep them nice.
I see many people in college that get a weekly allowance of anything ranging from $100 a week to $600 every two weeks. What the fuck? Right? I also see these same people disrespecting anything/everything they own, because they know mom and dad will pay for another, or their going to get their allowance money in three days. What a waste. If I could collect every extra dollar that was wasted purchases something that wasn’t necessary, I’d be a millionaire. Another thing that parents don’t realize is that a lot of that “allowance” money goes towards drugs. I know for a fact that you don’t eat $100 worth of food every week or whatever you tell your parents you need the money for. If parents knew this, I know for a fact this “allowance” money would stop coming in. These people get everything handed to them, and won’t know what to do financially when their out in the real world. I do realize that a lot of these kids will still be funded by mom and dad once out of college. What is that going to do for them? They aren’t going to be motivated to find a job and work for their own money. If they keep receiving money, what’s the point in finding a job right?
Another thing I have observed is that I am GLAD, I wasn’t home schooled or went to a private school. I have friends from both that are normal, but a lot don’t know what to do with themselves when they are put around people. Most people think kids that went through a private school had over protective parents, and that home schooled kids don’t have any of the basic social skills that most have once they turn 8. I have to say, that I think this is mostly true. A lot of kids that went to private schools just go crazy in college, because they weren’t exposed to anything and couldn’t learn from their mistakes. They realize that mom and dad aren’t there to stop them, and they go buck wild. That is not knowing their limits – doing a lot of drugs and drinking to much alcohol. Most people that were home schooled are just socially awkward. Sorry, but your parents fucked you in that department. And you’ll probably end up being that weird kid that doesn’t know how to interact with people, saying weird stuff, or just being plain annoying while around others. Thank you mom and dad for not homeschooling me and not sending me to a private high school.
Learning from your mistakes. Yes that dreaded word mis·take. Every time I was in trouble or made a mistake, my parents didn’t come running and help bail me out. They would be there in the end for me, but I had to learn. Many parents baby their kids and don’t treat them as adults. Doing things such as “that is to dangerous” or “No you can’t do that”. Everything is dangerous in life. I’m surprised more people aren’t blind because anything can poke you in the eye. I learned while growing up that if I did something wrong, I would have to face the consequences and more respectively, make things right. Whether that be apologizing to fixing the fence I broke or accepting the punishment of being grounded for two weeks. I believe punishment is one of the best things a child can learn from. They learn right away not to do a whatever they did. If parents just keep saying “don’t do that” without punishing them, what is to stop them from doing it again? But, if you spank them, ground them, whatever.. they learn not to do it again.
In the end, I would say that my upbringing was pretty normal. Now looking back, I now know that when I go out into the real world I will be ready, but I will still have that little anxiety tucked in the back of my stomach. I know how to work hard, monitor my money, and not be sociably awkward around people. I have to say, after all those years yelling “I hate you” to my parents, I feel really bad. They were just preparing me for this thing called life. I now realize that everything they did was for a reason, and whatever that reason was I now accept even if I didn’t back then. I thank my dad and mom for doing the best job in raising me.
