The Girls of Summer

The enthusiasim of youth. What I wouldn't give to have just an iota of that back! I've worked pretty much non-stop since I was 15 years old. I would love to have had one last summer to just veg out and be a kid.

It was a case of necessity on my part as far as working went. If I wanted to have clothes for school in the fall or go out with friends at all, I had to work. At that point in my life we had gone from being upper middle class to receiving welfare. It was a point when the nuclear energy industry was restructuring, plants were shutting down, etc. After 15+ years in the industry my dad found himself out of work and faced a bias that I had never given any thought to at that point in my young life. Ageism. He was in his early fifties and companies that he had the experience for weren't hiring. Why invest in him when he'd be gone from the job market in a few short years? Other places wouldn't hire him because he was too experienced and they couldn't pay him what he was used to making. Their reasoning was as soon as something that pays even a dollar more on the hour comes along, he'd be gone. He finally did find a job making about $8 an hour. This was the early 90's so $8 an hour was better than $8 an hour by todays standards, but when raising a family, paying bills and trying to pay medical bills, well, we all know it wasn't that great. My mother was bedridden after an accident, so that left me having to work.

You're right, you may not always get what you want, but you can usually manage to get what you need. Everyone needs that last summer to just be a kid. That summer where you hang out with friends and get to enjoy being young before the ensuing pressures of adulthood come knocking and in this day and age it seems to come earlier and earlier.