What Can We Leave Our Young Adults
Posted: Wednesday, March 26, 2008
by Susan Thom
Having three young adults, and each of them having anywhere from three to nine or ten friends, I have been quite in tune with how these kids, who are most certainly our future, think and behave. I have to say, I have been impressed. The girl with the blue hair had some very interesting thoughts on how we need to save our planet from pollution and excess of our environment. I let it slide that the dye going down her drain wasn't exactly good for any of us.
They have their clubs to go to and they enjoy the dancing and the moshing and the crowd surfing, and the music, and the drinking. All seems right with the world in their four walls of bliss. At two or three, lights out, and these young kids have to leave their reclusive hiding spot and face the world at large. If they live at home, they are either unhappy, or ashamed that by their age, they should be on their own. They either can't find a job, or have a menial paying one, and could never make a security payment, a rent payment, car payment, insurance, heat, electric, food, clothes, etc.
What can we teach these young adults? To work hard, for minimum wage, and they'll get somewhere in life? They'll be able to get married, have a car, a home, and all the essentials? They'll be able to have the kids they desire, and will be able to pay for them? I think not. It is quickly becoming a three paycheck household, with a double job for the man of the house, or maybe the woman, but three jobs may just make ends meet. You have your home, but you're not there as much as you are at work. You have your wife, or husband, but you never see them, and your baby started walking while you were on your second shift.
"Family living is the life for me", but where do you get the money for furniture, and food and utilities and cribs and clothes and formula, and diapers and toys? What do we have to offer our kids who didn't have the money, and couldn't afford the loans, to go to college? These young adults aren't always the one's opposing getting a better education, their father's bank book is, which puts him in the shame game because twenty years ago, we baby boomers were going to make a difference, remember? We were going to do better than our parents, and send our shining stars out into the world to make a good living.
I don't see it happening. Our kids don't see it happening. They are still young, so they go with the flow for now, but as a mother, it makes me ill that the world I brought my kids into, is letting them down terribly, and that makes me feel like I'm responsible for giving them their lives that are desperately trying to make it in this world. This isn't what I wanted for them. I knew I'd never be able to send them to college to be lawyers, or doctors, or Indian chiefs, but I thought they'd be able to exist, come on, this is America.
They are lost in a world that is meant to be inherited by them, but they don't have the trillions of dollars it would take to get us back on track. Hopefully, some of their classmates who were fortunate enough to go to college, will be altruistic, and politically inclined to save them, more than we adults have been able to save ourselves. There seems to be more of a camaraderie between our young people, and I hope that helps to some degree. None of them wants the world we're going to leave them, so someone has to make some changes.
Our kids are lost, and maybe we were when we were young, as well, however, we were supposed to find something for them that was better than what we had. Where is that? Where is the person who will become President and make the necessary changes so that we parents can be assured that our children will live a good life, and not be sent to war? Why can't all the billionaires, who are old enough not to be able to ever spend all their money, donate much needed millions to build apartment complexes that are affordably priced?
And some that are funded, or paid for, so people who don't have the money can live free? How can I feel good about passing down a legacy to my kids, when there are still hungry and homeless? Unless you have lived paycheck to paycheck, and had an accident happen, that led to the repossessing of your vehicles, and furniture, and home, and you have no family, and no money, you wouldn't know how important free shelter for you and your family would be.
Maybe, our young will have good ideas of their own to implement, now that we who are in our fifties are older, and tired. I certainly hope so. We have so much to lose if we don't turn things around, and so much to gain if we do.
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Yes. Best...........ePlease log in to respond to this comment.hi e, thank you for your time in reading and responding. appreciate it very much, my best regards, suePlease log in to respond to this comment.
Sue, you've reflected many of my thoughts in your article. It is mind-boggling and heart-tugging.....D.B.Please log in to respond to this comment.hi dianne, thank you for reading and commenting. it's a sad state of affairs, but who knows? maybe the kids of today can make a difference in the world of tomorrow, best regards, suePlease log in to respond to this comment.
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