Back-up Parents

"The Other Side" by Toby Morris

By the title of this post I don't mean "back-up parents" in the sense of, say, you are a child and your parents are drug users or other low lives and you have no models or no refuge when things go bad. In such cases, you may be fortunate to have some adult folks in your environment that serve as substitutes for parents. Indeed, for some of us, teachers once fulfilled that function, or at least they did back in the old, old days of the so-called terrible 1950s.

I come to the term "back-up parents" by my observations of parents in my milieu, the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Some of these are Sixties veterans, like myself, and others are younger, but we came of age at a good time, in the sense, that we transitioned from youth to adulthood with a good education, good jobs, and, for many of us now, great retirement plans. If the economy sucks for many Americans, not for us. To be fair, we often worked very hard.

The kids in this milieu, however, are of a different substance. Even if they went to privileged schools, they, like all other American kids, have experienced a certain dumbing down. Thus, their parents have done everything in their power to make sure that their own kids make the same transition to adulthood. When I have conversations with these parents -- usually the mothers in the locker room at the health club -- I learn that their children are now on the verge of adulthood and are contemplating careers. They have studied anthropology or women's studies or art history in college. They may have enjoyed a "gap year," during which they lived in Kenya and worked in "urban planning." Now it is time to make a career choice going forward, and it is generally of a feel-good sort, say, working for a non-profit. Whatever the merit of these jobs, they will not be exceedingly high paying, especially since the jobs -- with their outward show of trendiness -- are highly coveted. Lots of young, bright people with B.A.s in art history, for instance, gravitate to the glamour of museum jobs or art galleries. The salaries there, however, are not high paying. In other words, these children will probably not make as much in their own lifetimes as their parents or grandparents did.

That's where I come to the term back-up parents. The parents are there to back up their children financially as they enter adult life, for instance, to pay off their college loans or to lay down the money for their kids' first apartment. We are clearly entering a world of class distinctions, which have arisen since the Sixties generations assumed the reins of powers over the institutions of the U.S.

In contrast to such privileged kids, an ordinary American graduating from college with a degree in physical therapy -- a real profession, by the way -- will be paying $600 a month for the rest of her life (like my own physical therapist) and unable to buy her own personal computer (ditto). Her own parents are among those Americans who keep a roof over their head and expect their kids to work and do likewise.

The cartoon selection above is from the artist Toby Morris, who manages to put in a few pictures what I have less elegantly put into words.