We are the product of our environment

For good or bad, and there will definitely be both

This will, unsarcastically, probably be shocking to you, but your Dad and one of your uncles grew up poor. Poor is a loaded term, and I am not here to claim that there are not many people who have it worse than we had it. In fact, if you live in our country and have a home you sleep in at night, you are doing better than probably 80-90% of the world population. I will describe our level of poor for you, to give a perspective relative to the time and place we lived.

We had a place to sleep every night. We ate food. To the best of my knowledge, nothing was ever repossessed.

That food was paid for with other people’s money, as was the place to sleep. I suspect that some was paid for by both sets of Grandparents; I know a lot was paid for by my future-tense parents, in interest payments on personal loans and credit cards. Lest you think this is a middle class, overspend scenario, where the house was too big or a car too expensive, I will give details. The car was an old Honda that broke down all the time. The place to sleep was a two-bedroom half of a duplex. All three brothers in one room, Mom and Dad in the other, and the sound of the Meth-head in the front half of the duplex beating his girlfriend a few times a week coming through the wall; until it stopped, not because he got sober, but because he took it up a level, stabbing her, and went to jail. I believe she was evicted shortly after.

That was the duplex, here is the neighborhood, from what I recall.

There was the time your Uncle and I were playing outside when a man ran up, looking frantic. He tried to run into the house, but Grandma stood in the door, aware she could not lock the door with us outside, and calmly told him he could jump a fence or run back to the front, there was no other path. He kicked a few boards out of the fence, which released Max, the massive rottweiler that haunted my dreams. Max proceeded to bite the man’s crotch and shake him like a ragdoll, dragging him around the yard until the police showed up. Apparently he was running from the police who were chasing him for murder or attempted murder. The police drove him back to our house to identify him. Messed up on drugs and scared out of his mind, I doubt he could have found it. Nine hours of time to sober up in jail later, I suspect he knew where we lived.

The family across the street was a wonderful family, and their son Santiago (whom everyone called Taco) was our best friend. Three of the five children went to jail, that I am currently aware of, two for drug and gang violence, one for sexually abusing children. That was the neighborhood. Even the ones with parents trying their best faced bad odds.

How did we become poor? I am not 100% sure, I wasn’t around or aware when it happened. My basic understanding is this. Grandpa flunked out of college because he was too busy travelling to see Grandma in college, or perhaps busy partying. Mom dropped out. They both grew up in stable homes, with parents who lived through or were heavily effected by the Great Depression. Their parents made it work, and provided, because they knew the alternative. Their parents worked hard, did not pass up on opportunities and did not waste. My parents assumed it would always work out, because their parents made sure it did in their lives up until then.

So they got married, moved a few states away and set up shop. No education, no real work history, no support network. It would work out, their whole lives had. He managed a Big 5 Sporting Goods, she was a night waitress at Denny’s. Then they kept having children and realized this wasn’t going to work, so Grandpa decided to go back to college. I recall living in Washington, but it wasn’t until we moved to Southern Oregon for college that memories really are consistent.

I have very few memories of my parents fighting in front of us, or in general. Oh, they bickered, they got frustrated and sometimes were short. They are human. We did not see them fight though. But then, we went to bed, and those paper thin walls did not block a thing. Mom screaming, “How are we going to buy food? The rent is due, and we are overdrawn and the cards are maxed out.” Dad, forever ataraxic, saying, “It will work out, it will be fine.” Then Mom crying.

One might ask, was there not assistance available for a family of five in need? Probably, but Grandpa is stubborn. He is against government for everything, even when he needs it. He worked as a manager at GI Joe’s sporting goods store, and I am sure 90% of that money went to his college costs. Instead of taking welfare, our half of the duplex became a state sanctioned daycare center for people on welfare. In Southern Oregon, this equates to a lot of young children with severe disabilities due to drug use during pregnancy. It was a very chaotic house. But we had a place to live, and we ate. We also listened to our Mom scream every night and then cry.

What changed?

Grandpa graduated from college around the same time that my Mom’s Father passed away. His widowed wife wanted her daughter nearby again, and bought a house to rent to my parents. My Dad used his degree and got a decent job, and was able to pay off all the money owed; not through hard work, but through having a Mother-in-Law as a landlord. She charged almost nothing in rent, and did not care when it was paid. She had her family near her again.

I am unaware of when I stop remembering being poor, it was gradual. First, the house was bigger, and the landlord didn’t care about rent, so we did not listen to fights anymore. Then, eventually, our car stopped breaking down every two weeks, and we didn’t wear shoes until there was nothing left. Yes, this is probably why I wear shoes that have holes on the tops, sides and bottoms to this day. I can’t prove it, but I am pretty sure.

Eventually I was old and brave enough to ask, and I found out that we did not have debt anymore. Then they bought the house we rented from my Grandma (GG), for well under market rate. My Mom went back to college and became a teacher. Sometime around late highschool or early college I realized that we no longer were not poor, but could probably accurately be described as upper-middle class. Now I would probably go farther than that, and say that Grandma and Grandpa would be wealthy, if Grandpa didn’t like new cars and toys so much.

That was a lot, sorry. The problem is, that was only the introduction to what I want to discuss.

I remember this clearly, as does my older brother. We discuss it on our bike rides, and sometimes laugh about it, or just see if it explains some things about us. Our younger brother has no recollections from this period, at all, as far as we can tell.

The youngest blows money like you would not believe. Saving seems pointless to him. Before he was married, I bailed him out on numerous occasions, only to find out that so had our parents, on the same occasions. If there is money, it is for travel, or Chipotle, or whatever. Now that he is married, with two high earning incomes, he will sometimes say little things and I realize, “Oh, you spend everything you make... both incomes.”

Of course he does. He remembers money always being available. Cars could be fixed, clothes replaced, restaurants open to provide food.

Not me and my older brother. He got a Master’s in a boring field because it is always employable and pays well. I got a Union job that offers amazing benefits and stability, and then lived with roommates in crappy places to make sure my rent was less than a week’s pay. We pay cash for everything we can. We save money, probably at times to the detriment of the present. Both of us have stuck with jobs we hate; not just that we don’t like, but that are dragging us down mentally and emotionally, because they pay well and are stable. Security is not something we take for granted. Stability is gold to us. I am currently in school for a Master’s degree I hope to never use, just to have a solid plan B if I get fed up with my job or boss.

I do not believe that money buys happiness, but I know that lack of money causes misery and despair.

I know that I have never worried about my parents’ marriage, except those nights of screaming. I understand that I was too young to realize that my Grandparents would not have let us starve, because we were fortunate enough to have a large, loving extended family, but at the time, the fear was very real and alive.

In short, I am a product of my environment. Just as my brothers are. Just as we all are. Why did I choose this specific topic to drive home this point? I could have used two parents, or religion, or suburban life, and written a post about how I am a product of it. Instead, I chose this.

Because each of you, obviously, will be a product of your environment. Just like I was, but more importantly, just like my parents were. You will not have lived in crime filled neighborhoods, will not move over and over again, starting new schools as we go from one hell hole to another. I suspect none of you will ever remember living anywhere but the house we have now. Your Mother and I do not fight about money, other than me grumbling about why her haircuts cost $100 when mine cost $25, after a $10 tip. In my defense, Linda has been cutting my hair for decades, and the pandemic was very hard on her business. The least I can do is tip up to the normal cost of a haircut in our area.

Sometimes I wonder if we should fake it. If we should make life a little less certain and secure, so that you know it does not always work out. As a Father, I cannot bring myself to do that, but I worry that is my short sighted desire for your contentment crushing my big picture goal for you to be happy, productive, stable people. We do not say, “We can’t afford that.” We always say, “We are choosing not to spend/waste money on that.” I don’t want to lie, we can afford it, I just am not going to by the junky plastic toy at Target when you have a million others and it will be forgotten. But will you learn that some people really cannot afford things?

We broach the topic, when walking by tents or seeing people under a tarp. I do my best to explain circumstance as well as personal choices. I try to explain that there are always things we can do to better our situation, or make it worse, but that a lot of it comes down to the hand we are dealt.

We discuss money when it comes to spending, and why we spend on what we spend on.

We explain why some friends have bigger houses, and others smaller.

You know that sometimes you have friends that cannot do every gymnastics camp with you, and you are aware at times you are told you can’t do something because it is too expensive.

I doubt any of this will make a difference. I suspect that only the actual experience of being uncertain about your situation will drive the point home, and that worries me.

I want to be very clear, what we have is not what everyone has. We are blessed, fortunate, lucky… pick your term. The reasons for this vary.

A portion of it can be chalked up to the fact that your Mother and I do not eat out, that we had a very informal, cheap wedding, and that we plan. A non-zero portion of it is the fact that we have managed with one car, despite having multiple children, for years. A large chunk of it can be credited to the fact that between the two of us, we had very low student loans thanks to our families. An even bigger chunk of it can be traced back to the fact that I took the Personal Finance merit badge very seriously and then read and educated myself thoroughly; which is to say, I was not ignorant about concepts like APR, loan terms, and compound interest.

You need to learn these things as well. I am doing my best to teach you, and will continue, but no education can offset bad decisions stemming from short sightedness. Life has, thus far, worked out well for us. That could easily change. Do not assume your life will work out just the same. Assume that financial issues will come, and plan for them. If you do, they will not tip you when they arrive.

There are people who make bad choices consistently, but that is usually ignorance. There are a lot more who make decent choices and then a roll of the dice does not pan out. Assume the dice will not pan out, and plan accordingly. My fear, however, remains as it was. That these are empty words that will fall on deaf ears; not because you are stubborn or unintelligent, but because you are products of your environment.

There are a few ways to learn a lesson. First: make a mistake, and learn. Second: watch someone close to you make a mistake, and learn. Third: listen to people who have lived it, hear them and learn.

Please choose the third option.

Love,
Dad