When I was younger, I never really thought about everything my family has given me. It’s not something many people think about on a daily basis, especially when you’re a kid. So as I sat here thinking about what this article could be about, family popped into my head. Thinking about it now, I don’t give my family enough credit–especially my parents.
I’ve always had a close relationship with my family. I’m close with my parents, close with my three siblings, so it’s something I kind of always thought it was something everyone had, but as I got older, there were quite a few people I knew that weren’t close with their families. As I thought about that, it got me thinking about everything my family does for me. Everything I never took into account before.
One thing I’ve always noticed about my parents, is that they’ve never tried to force me to do something I didn’t want to do, they never pushed me to do things I didn’t like. For example, whenever I would talk about what I wanted to do after high school, my mom would always tell me to do whatever I wanted to do. And while I did have to go through the big lectures my dad gave me about how something in particular wouldn’t make you very much money, I knew he just wanted me to be able to support and take care of myself when I got older. Every time I was interested in something, I began to do a bunch of research to find out how much you make with that job, so I got a little paranoid, but my mom always assured me that it’s better to do something you love instead of dreading going to work everyday.
When you were young, you probably always hated when you would get big talks about how you had to study more and keep your grades up so you could have a decent career when you got older, right? Everyone hates those talks, but I realize now (I guess it just took me a while) that they only want what’s best for you. Everyone says parents are supposed to steer their kids in the right direction, and that’s always what my parents have done, but it’s hard to get that during that actual time.
There were so many times when my dad would talk about what would happen if I didn’t keep my grades up, that I wouldn’t be able to support myself, and I used to kind of feel like he was assuming I wouldn’t be able to do that, that I wasn’t going to get a good job. Although he made me feel like that sometimes, I know that wasn’t what he intended to do, he probably should have just worded what he said better, but he just wanted to get through to me with the fact that you have to work hard if you want a good career, and you have to work hard to be able to support yourself.
Through my years in school, I always struggled with Math and still do, but I can remember my dad helping me with whatever homework I had. Even when I got into grade nine and above, when it got a little too hard for him because it had been so long since he’d learned that stuff, he never just told me he couldn’t do it and left me to figure it out by himself. No matter how long it took to finish maybe only a few questions, but he would keep searching through the book until he found where it showed you how to do something.
With that, I can also remember all the times I would tell my parents that I felt “stupid” in Math class because I seemed to be the only one in the class who didn’t understand anything, they would never make me feel that way. They would always tell me that I wasn’t the only one who didn’t understand it and I wasn’t the only one who didn’t want to raise their hand and ask for help from the teacher because they didn’t want to seem stupid. Like my mom always told me (but I believe she heard it from someone else, so it’s not the most original thing out there) is that there’s no such thing as a stupid question.
While it seemed the only thing this article was about was my stories from school, the whole point of it was that I believe I take my family for granted everyday. I take for granted all the help my parents have given me over the years and the help they continue to give, and the relationship I have with my siblings. It makes me realize that, if they want it or not, not everybody has that with their family. It really makes you think about how much you actually appreciate your family, because that could all be taken away from you.
My brother once told my sister and I that one of his friends asked him if he was close with him family, and he told them not really. I can remember my sister asking him he would say that, considering we’ve always been a close family. Like I said, since it’s something we’ve always had, and it’s normal to us, he didn’t consider us that close. Growing up with something, you don’t realize that other people may not have the same thing, so you don’t appreciate it enough. Writing this article, I’ve never realize how many things my family has done for me and I couldn’t be more thankful for them.
