I don't remember when it happened, but I stopped believing in certain
things way back when.
I no longer expect to have a retirement fund.
I no longer expect to own a house.
I have no expectation of paying off my student loans before I die.
I have no expectations of getting married or having children.
I no longer expect to work the same job for 30 years, and then retire
from it.
I no longer expect the best out of the majority of people.
These may sound like bleak ideas, but...broken down, I don't think many
other people could argue against these ideas. I know plenty of my friends, both
here in the Midwest and those across the country, who hold these same beliefs.
Your first response to this might be something along the lines of
"you should be more positive" or "with enough hard work, you can
achieve these things." Don't say that or you'll miss my point entirely.
I'm nearly 40 years old and, while I have plenty of life left to live, these
are my OBSERVATIONS and ANECDOTAL STORIES rather than any kind of hard factual
or statistical analysis leading to a greater truth.
RETIREMENT FUND: I've been in the work force since I was 15, starting
off doing construction work during the summer to pay for a trip to Washington,
D.C. the following year. From then on, I've worked the last 23 years non-stop
with maybe a grand total of three months where I've been unemployed during that
entire time. Work is not a foreign concept to me, having had three jobs during
undergrad and a full time, hard manual labor job during graduate school. I'm
currently looking for a second job purely so I can, yet again, simply have a
buffer to help take care of the important stuff: car repairs, medical, a dinner
out more than once a month, etc.
I have a 401k plan like most, but after experiencing the events of 2007
and 2008, I don't trust that it will be there long enough for me to actually do
anything with it. I'd love to add money to it, but I'm barely scraping by as is
after FINALLY getting a position situated in my career choice. For now, I have
to build up the experience necessary before moving on to something else. This
is fixable on my end, dependent upon the choices I make.
HOME OWNERSHIP: Honestly, at this point? I could give a shit about
owning a house. There's certainly the argument that I'm just wasting money by
not having my rent payments be mortgage payments, but I find that to be a
garbage argument based on the POSSIBILITY of the home becoming a kind of
savings account (the expectation being that one will make money on the home
later, which isn't guaranteed by any means). Add on the fact that I don't have
to worry about paying out of pocket for HVAC repairs, plumbing, electrical
repairs, etc...and why would I want to own a house/home/condo? I do
not trust the market or the fluctuation of time to hold steady enough for this
to be a viable thing any more.
STUDENT LOANS: I mean, what can I really say about this one? We're sold
the idea that education will open up more opportunity, but with stagnating
wages often stagnating more, why would I ever expect my student loan payments
to disappear? Despite making monthly payments for the last seven years, my
grand total is some $30k more than I originally borrowed, which is a pretty
messed up situation. What the student loan industry is doing to the vast
majority of people in this country is criminal. Plain and simple.
I took out the loans, I make the payments, so I accept the
responsibility of all of that. Still...
MARRIED/CHILDREN: This directly ties into the previous issues because
it's wrapped up in finances - apparently, it's expensive to raise a child. And
while, yes, I understand that nobody is ever really financially ready for
child-rearing, the longer I live, the less I want to have a family of my own.
I've come to really enjoy and appreciate my solitude and the freedom of time
and space it provides me in terms of my creating. If that sounds selfish,
well...it probably is. But at least I can admit it better than most.
And though finances are tied to this, this is another concept where my
stance can be easily changed in the future. Is it likely to change? Maybe only
on the marriage front, but pretty unlikely on the child front despite how
amazing an experience it might be.
RETIRE FROM ONE JOB: I'm finally working a corporate job
now. I'm actually in a cubicle farm. I've been here for two years and, in a
building of about 500 people, I've seen two people actual retire while several
people (who had been here for 30+ years) were "let go" right on the
cusp of their retirement. I'm obviously making assumptions (correct or not)
about the intent of the higher-ups in these firings, but that doesn't bode well
when more people are let go near the end of their working life as opposed to
allowed to retire when they're supposed to. Not only am I seeing these
instances happen right in front of me, I continue to hear about them from
friends and family.
I'm fully expecting to work until I am planted in the
ground. I've had zero illusions about that for a very long time and that's a
little depressing.
EXPECTING THE BEST OF PEOPLE: This is something I see on a
daily basis and I believe it's getting worse. For whatever reason, I see a more
selfish nation. Sure, there are people out there doing the good work, but
ultimately I experience a "screw you, I got mine" kind of attitude
that's pretty damn disappointing, honestly. I'm not saying we should go
full-on socialist, but holy hell...where do we end up drawing the line on
selfish behavior?
The number of people in my groups of friends that I can
trust is dwindling. Perhaps this is the nature of aging. Perhaps this is me
being more cognizant of my time and being pickier about who I share it with.
But I've seen some former friends do some pretty sketchy things and it makes me
wonder what led them to that point. It also makes me wonder why I didn't step
in, or if I did, why I was unable to stop their soul from plummeting ever
downward.
We're all trying to sell ourselves to the general public,
whether it's something we've created, something we do at work, our ideas, our
hopes, our fears...maybe this is just the nature of the era of social media.
Maybe the tools that we use have moved us to become salesmen of the self. It
goes beyond "look at me/pay attention to me," but at its heart,
that's exactly what it is, affecting some more and affecting others less. We
all, to some degree, want to be exalted. Many of us badly want to be remembered
or have our voices heard, so we all end up shouting over each other.
In many ways, I can't really fault that line of thinking.
Honestly, who really wants to be forgotten?
Let me be clear: I'm not complaining about my place in this
life. I'm certainly far better off than many and I've been given many
opportunities that others will never experience. These are just a few things
I've observed over the last 20ish years as someone who's taken an active
approach in paying attention to my surroundings and those of the people in my
orbit.
I'm a mostly positive person, but I'm also a pretty cynical
person because I've seen how these situations play out time and time
again...and the results are overwhelmingly disappointing.
/rant.
(110,694)
