Understanding the Parents

Before I proceed to vilify my parents somewhat, I must state that I know that their motivations were and are pure. They simply want what they think was best for me. The circumstances in which they grew up were completely different from the ones which I experienced.

They grew up in a South Korea that had been ravaged by the Korean War, struggling to rebuild itself after a crippling Japanese occupation. Each parent has stories to recount. Before my mother was born (she being the second youngest of seven), her parents had spent the early years of their marriage in Manchuria, where my grandfather managed to amass a small fortune. However, upon returning to Korea after World War II, he saw his fortune reduced to nothing because of the devaluation of the currency. He managed to find success in other business ventures, but even though they were relatively well-to-do, things like meat and eggs were considered luxuries to be eaten on rare occasions.

My dad's parents escaped to South Korea from the North soon after the Communists took over. The family was fairly affluent early in my father's childhood (my father was the second eldest of seven). However, my grandfather made a few bad investments which reduced the family to poverty. My father vividly remembers being evicted from his house as a child, and how he and his whole family were forced to leave their home in the middle of the night, carrying their blankets and other belongings on their heads. I remember him quietly and somberly telling me how one time he remembers his father dropped a bowl of rice on the floor, but since the family was so poor, he dusted it off and ate it, and gave my father a clean bowl. At a young age, my father started tutoring other students to help support his family.

My parents did not want this for me.

I know there are people who have experienced much worse, but these stories are meant to illustrate why my parents were so risk-averse when it came to a career choice. This is why my father became a doctor (as opposed to an astrophysicist, which is what he wanted to be) and why my mother chose to marry one. And why they wanted my brother and me to become a doctor as well. Their rationale was that there are always patients, and so a doctor would always have a means to make a living.

However, sometimes what parents think is best for their children isn't. Sometimes I wonder what sort of thing my children will resent me for -- will they want to pursue a more traditional path than me and will we be at odds because I want them to try something else? Or will it be because I make my four children start a rock band and they resent me for robbing them of their childhood?

Wait, what?