What are we “Entitled” to now?

It all started out next to a cornfield in Indiana (laugh all you want Michelle), I was the short girl with the chili bowl haircut with a serious addiction to Electric Youth perfume, Oregon Trail, YM quizzes, and Paula Abdul. My life was anything but normal. I lived with my crazy sister who had a red mullet and my mother, a children’s librarian, and I absolutely hated to read. My sister Ann and I were the typical 80s children who would sit up every night with the easy bake oven, fighting over why she would always cut my Barbie’s hair, watching Beetlejuice for the 100th time (still scared to this day) and making up new dances to ‘Vogue.’ The only break my sister would take is to escape to her room when she didn’t think I was looking for a quick interview with “Oprah” in the mirror gushing over her big Oscar win. To put it quite frankly, we had big dreams and not a care in the world, life was perfect.

Growing up with such a quaint family made you appreciate the small things in life, but made the dreams so much bigger! Of course Ann and I wanted to move to LA to be Candice Cameron’s best friend (perhaps I could’ve scored a date with her brother Kirk before he went all holy) but we did what our mother called the “right thing” and went to school, boring… that’s where 21 years ago I met one of my best friends to this day, Susie. Susie and I grew up together carpooling to/from school with our annoying little siblings who we couldn’t be bothered with during one of our daily car games of “My House!” But it was another particular car ride just last week that inspired this blog….

We were driving to Chicago sharing our favorite memories from growing up and laughing up a storm when all of a sudden the conversation quickly turned to politics and the upcoming election (is it over yet ps?) and then one thing led to another and we proceeded to talk about how awful and depressing the economy is these days… We started to realize more and more how happy-go-lucky we were when we were kids making up dances and playing dress up! I sat there staring out the window just wishing we could go back to those days when we didn’t have a care in the world but quickly coming back to the realization of how different our lives are now….. yet I couldn’t help but wonder if we truly understood how lucky we really were. We were given everything (and more) and it’s almost like we didn’t know any better than to “expect” it, not like today when everyone is counting every penny. What happened to the good old days? So Susie brought up a good point…

We come from the Entitlement Generation; we are what “they” call the Millenials. The dictionary describes it as “the group born between 1979 and 1994 who believe they are owed certain rights and benefits without further justification.” We are optimistic and believe we are “entitled” to everything; growing up we had our Zach Morris cell phones and our own cars, we went to private schools and were given money to go to the movies and out with our friends. The generation where everything is supposed to fall in your lap and the biggest concern you had was what you were going to wear Friday night to the football game or if you had a date to this years Fall Carnival. Can you take me back to those times? Please! Imagine the shock someone from this generation goes through when he/she graduates from school and enters the “real” world! I thought jobs were supposed to find us!

Seriously, did I miss the class that taught us about the hard ships of life after college or let’s be honest they should start a class entitled “How to survive: Life after college, being cut off by your parents 101.” That was a huge eye opener for anyone of our generation; I mean why do I have to pay a doctor bill, isn’t that free? If I am sick aren’t I “entitled” to go to the doctor for free? I did not choose to be sick. Aren’t I “entitled” to go to school for free and have someone else pay the student loans? What? Mom and dad aren’t paying for my vacation? Who’s paying for dinner? Isn’t there a job waiting for me with a fantastic salary and a month of vacation time which I will start taking next week? Oh and isn’t it right that this job will totally turn my career around and before you know it I’ll be a VP and with the company for 20+ years!! Haha.. yeah right!!! Oh and let me back up…. car insurance, what is that? Are we destined to learn from watching the latest “Survivor?” I do not remember Donna and Brenda going through this phase.

So I guess the lesson learned is that even if we were born in this so-called “Entitlement Generation” that the media, sociologists, and even employers so kindly label us as doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing, it’s what you make of it. We learn from these life experiences and that’s how we grow as a person (if you so wish, we all know someone that is still stuck in the entitlement phase, yikes)…. but then again - If we “desire” it and “want” it bad enough doesn’t that mean we’ll just work that much harder in the work place? Well I know one things for sure this kid with the chili bowl haircut who grew up in the cornfields of Indiana wants that high paying successful job, flexible work hours and definitely a lot of vacation days and I am definitely “entitled” to that! Right?????? (ha!)