I was really hoping to experience the old “My parents were right all along” revelation that so much folk wisdom says is inevitable. Unfortunately, the older I get, the more experiences I have and the more perspective I gain… my parents really look worse and worse. I would rather it be the other way, and ultimately I am sadder for my younger self as I age.

Edit: I see this is now top comment and I kind of wanted to add onto this. I still have a little hope for this to happen yet, but I am in my 30s and well into the age when I would have expected this revelation to appear. There are still milestones ahead I’ve yet to experience: namely, I don’t have children of my own yet. There are more grand perspective shifts ahead of me, and I still have some hope I may come to understand and forgive my father someday. It hasn’t happened yet, and I can’t imagine making the same unloving and neglectful choices as he did. I keep my mind open to the possibility of letting go.

My father’s career advise to my brother and me was “Make lots of money so I can come live with you when I get old.”

My brother didn’t like that advise so he did a bunch of research and asked a bunch of people about their careers. He got a masters in an Engineering field but hated working in that field. So he got another masters. He doesn’t use it for his career.

I studied Chemistry and left grad school to do software development with no degree in it (it was the 80s). I never used my degree either.

Confronting my dad about his bad career advise would have just gotten his Standard Response to Criticism™–But I’m lovable.

And no he never lived with either of us. But then he never go old.

Oof too real