My sophomore daughter just texted me a while ago. She said she's coming home for a visit, but before she left her and her friend's rented unit, she said she brought her clothes to the laundry. Again? She has no classes today, why couldn't she wash the clothes herself?
Over the past months, as I write lots and lots of articles just to increase my income to be able to support her, I sometimes spend some time thinking how my daughter and the others her age are unable to be conscious about cutting their expenses and about stretching their allowance.
When I was in college decades ago, I also rented. But not in a way like my daughter and her friends do today. In those days, we were eight in a room, with the beds covered with cardboard and with the bathroom and toilet outside the room and shared with other renters of the house. Water pressure was too weak that we had to wake up at 4 am to store water. When we need to hang our wet clothes, we had to use a pole with a hook at the tip to reach the clothesline outside a small window.
These things, my daughter and students in her age group would never experience. They expect and demand convenience and comfort. They expect to eat in those fastfood restaurants just like their friends. They expect that Mom and Dad have money to pay. My daughter rents a small studio-type unit with a former high-school classmate. There were cheaper rental alternatives, such as a safe dormitory very near her school. But she's lots of reasons against them.
Anyway, it's not all her fault. We let her. So she expects. We give her most of what she wants, so she expects. And then I complain.
Over the past months, as I write lots and lots of articles just to increase my income to be able to support her, I sometimes spend some time thinking how my daughter and the others her age are unable to be conscious about cutting their expenses and about stretching their allowance.
When I was in college decades ago, I also rented. But not in a way like my daughter and her friends do today. In those days, we were eight in a room, with the beds covered with cardboard and with the bathroom and toilet outside the room and shared with other renters of the house. Water pressure was too weak that we had to wake up at 4 am to store water. When we need to hang our wet clothes, we had to use a pole with a hook at the tip to reach the clothesline outside a small window.
These things, my daughter and students in her age group would never experience. They expect and demand convenience and comfort. They expect to eat in those fastfood restaurants just like their friends. They expect that Mom and Dad have money to pay. My daughter rents a small studio-type unit with a former high-school classmate. There were cheaper rental alternatives, such as a safe dormitory very near her school. But she's lots of reasons against them.
Anyway, it's not all her fault. We let her. So she expects. We give her most of what she wants, so she expects. And then I complain.
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