Dear Amy: I am a 21-year-old man who has spent large portions of the last few years out of school and working part time because of an arrangement I’ve had with my parents to help them by babysitting my two siblings, who are 10 and 4.
Recently I was offered a full-time position at a local company, and I intend to take it. Now my mother has decided to demand money from me when I start this job. I’ve never asked her for a dime for babysitting! But now that I have a full-time job, she is insisting on my “chipping in around the house.” My mother does not help me pay for school, car or any other bills.
I believe it is completely unfair for her to ask for money after years of offering me no economic assistance whatsoever and knowing full well that I have to pay for school on my own. I’ve been as selfless as possible when she’s needed me, but I have to take a stand for my own needs. What should I do?
– Disheartened
Dear Disheartened: Viewed from another perspective, your mother might feel that providing child care for siblings is an unpaid family duty (like other family obligations) that comes along with being a member of a family that happens to have young children. I agree that if your folks deliberately stifled your progress to get you to be a live-in manny, it was unfair of them and generous of you.
Now that you are 21 and taking such commendable steps with your life, use your new maturity to negotiate with your mother. What exactly does “chipping in around the house” entail? Does it mean contributing toward the cost of groceries and utilities, or does it mean paying for babysitting services out of your pocket now that you aren’t around to provide these services for free? Once school and full-time work start, you are going to be busy. You need to work out exactly what will be expected of you. Your mother wasn’t businesslike with you in the past; you need to be businesslike now.
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Dear Amy: I would like to respond to the issue raised in your column about people who take their dogs into stores. You criticized Paris Hilton for taking her little dogs everywhere.
I probably took my bichon frise in stores long before Paris Hilton did. My bichon, Tallulah, has her own stroller and has been going shopping with me in malls and other stores for more than four years.
She sits in her stroller, does not make noises, does not touch people or merchandise, makes no messes and thoroughly enjoys her trips.
She goes everywhere we go (in her stroller) except food stores and restaurants. I have never had a complaint.
You are right: If people don’t know how to manage a dog or other pets, they are better left at home. Never put them on a store counter that other people use. Respect for others and courtesy is the issue here.
– Helen in Ocala, Fla.
Dear Helen: When I was a kid, there was a woman in town who wheeled a little dog around in a baby carriage. Now, whenever I see a dog being wheeled in a stroller or strapped to its owner’s chest encased in a Snugli, I can’t help but think, “I wonder whatever happened to ‘Crazy Betty.”‘ I’ve received many letters from readers accusing me of being a dog hater and a Paris Hilton hater because I wondered in this space whether carrying dogs around in handbags was good for the dogs.
I love dogs. I’m all about dogs. But it shows a real lack of balance for people to assume that their dogs should take precedence over the comfort and well-being of other people.
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