When a straddler has a kid the first thing they notice is that this kid is not working
class uh there's nothing in this kid about about that I'd like to be my kids kid or something
like that yeah exactly uh and and so they'll the they will worry about this having these
kids having a sense of entitlement they'll check they'll check 'em for entitlement like
a parent checks a kids eyes for drug use you know I don't want you to to be like them you
know I I want you to have these I want you to have these uh characteristics that You
know the modesty or the work ethic or the the you know sense of family the the these
kinds of things but but how can you keep a child from having this sense of entitlement
this this cultural capital when you are lavishing them with with uh books and and and and games
and and just just you are now the person chauffeuring them around from activity to activity and
you've become a fully integrated member of the middle class and that that child will
be too well some people said to me they they wonder what gets lost uh when when that kid
uh grows up you know what what do they have what what won't they have and and they have
a hard time expressing that because they say well I had this life of relative uh deprivation
you know we we worried about having the uh the electricity turned on or uh we we worried
about there being heat turn off the lights that was always a big thing yeah yeah one
one person I talked to said you know they had remembered as children having to be silent
in the house while the while the uh the bill collectors came so I mean that's certainly
nothing you want your kid to to have to go through but at the same time there is there's
a sense of being working class of of of coming from blue collar that they know will not will
not be there and and they don't want their kids to think that uh everything just magically
appears that everything is is handed to them there was one straddler I talked to who said
every night he'll sit in the great room of hi very expensive home and tell the kids it
isn't it wonderful that we have a fire isn't it great that that we have these these beautiful
art fixtures and the kids look at him like like he's crazy but because it's hard to teach
uh that that notion to them the there's a uh a guy who wants his kid to spend his Summer
vacations working on fishing boats I mean his wife said did you see the Perfect Storm
you know what goes on this is the most dangerous job in the world but he wants him to have
some idea of what hard manual labor is like uh of what what it means to to to work for
something and not just have it have it given to you yeah and you also talk and boy this
resonated with me I only hope that uh I do the right thing in this regard uh you talk
about uh people who have become very wealthy starting from working class backgrounds uh
trying to insure that their children as opposed to some of the things you saw as you were
quote moving up unquote that their children treat working class people decently and with
an appreciation for what human beings are going through and just what is called these
days the dignity of the human being there there's a Boston investment banker I I spoke
with who started crying when he when he was talking to me about hoping that the people
he uh worked with and by by the people he worked with I mean by the janitors uh by the
support staff in his building hoped that they didn't think that he was some kind of Harvard
snob he said who who didn't care about people uh similarly when these people look at their
children uh they know they have this incredible safety net the there are some guys I spoke
with in this book who they're rich enough to have their own jets rich enough to live
anywhere they want but they don't they live uh modestly because they don't want their
kids to to just be totally exposed to that kind of world of riches I mean the money is
there and and they fail when when they try to say that there is no money be because the
kids kids know that the net is is beneath them but at the same time these parents are
trying to teach them uh a lesson in in knowing that you have to make your own way you have
to fight your own way in this world but it's a it's a hard lesson to teach when you have
a lot of money tell about the people whom you have I think you had some in your own
life you met some and you were told by others about people who they'll just throw stuff
on the floor and say ah well somebody will pick it up yeah there's a story in the book
about uh uh this young woman who fell in love with this guy uh he called she called him
the Trustafarians you know these trust fund kids who who think that they're Bohemians
you know and they go to college and they uh I mean once they leave college they'll snap
right back into that to that kind of uh the way daddy and mommy want them to be bu but
for the time being they're out there and this woman talked about just being so in love with
this guy and they would follow the Grateful Dead around the country just this crazy kind
of hippy life uh they were both drinking beers one night and uh it was time to go and and
and the girl said well let me just put the beer can down somewhere and the and the boyfriend
the Trustafarian just knocked the beer can out of her hand and said they have people
here to clean that stuff up let's just get out of here and and she knew it that second
that she wasn't in love with him anymore she knew at that second that the differences between
them were were so great that they there could be no future it was her people that do the
cleaning up exactly This excerpt is brought to you by the Massachusetts School of Law