Dear Joseph

A letter of advice written to my future son.

Dear Joseph,

                I hear you’ve recently forsaken your education in order to pursue a life of hardwork and activism towards a Communist utopian world.  Your grades have fallen; you’ve gone from top of your class to one of the lower kids in just a matter of months.  The time you used to use for studying, you now use to preach the nobility of the working man, and against the evils of capitalist oppression.  Son, I understand fully your teenage delusions of grandeur.  When I, too, was in my first semester of eleventh grade, I did exactly the same thing; this déjà vu feeling is almost overwhelming.  I, too, felt that my time in school was sorely wasted.  Why get good grades when I could do something useful, like build a house?  Why should I spend all of my time and energy in school to later be a cog in the imperialist, evil machine of capitalism, when my time could be spent instigating the American equivalent of the Bolshevik Revolution?  At this time, the only books I’d read were DIY construction manuals, and every piece of literature I could find which was dedicated to the Cause; I still am unsure of that Cause was.

                I’m done trying to use political theory to make you see the folly of Communism; frankly, your political beliefs are of no real concern to me, or anyone else, believe it or not.  Your mother honestly has no interest in politics, and I’m sure most of your teachers side with you.  We’re honestly not part of the oppressive system of capitalism, or whatever you’re thinking.  And if you’re genuinely interested in blue-collar work, that’s fine.  I’m not here to put anyone’s career choice down; I’ve gotten enough of that in my life for being a teacher.  You just need to understand some things.  I know you truly believe you know everything, but trust me, kid, you don’t.  You’ve never worked a day in all of your seventeen years; I, at least, cut grass once a week when I was your age.  Yet, you expect to be a construction worker, just like your grandfather, my dad.  You don’t understand how hard the work is.  The summer of the year I thought I was a Communist, I worked as a helper with your grandfather.  Well, I shouldn’t say that I worked the whole summer.  I quit after a week of grueling, mind-numbing, tedious work.  Every day of that week, I came home drenched in sweat, my muscless aching, and drained of the energy to even think.  It’s rather hard to be a great, revolutionary intellectual when you can’t think.  That was the hardest part.  You and I, son, are thinkers.  I later worked day labor before starting college, and during, whenever I could.  It wasn’t a career; it was a means of making extra cash.  I still hated it, but by then, I was desperate for any sort of work; the recession back then really sucked.

                Something you do need to understand is the pay.  You’ve yet to have learned the value of the dollar.  Your grandfather was a supervisor at his construction company.  He made seventeen dollars an hour.  Yet, he still made only just enough to take care of the family.  I made seven-fifty an hour; about fifty bucks if I were lucky enough to work a full, eight-hour day.  And that’s before the Feds took a chunk of my paycheck.  I may not make much as a teacher, but I make enough.  You’re a lucky kid to be born into a nation with a free and public education (thank God the Republicans haven’t destroyed that as they had hoped), and you’re squandering it.  Worse, and this pisses me off more than anything, you’re squandering your talents.  You’ve got the single most valuable commodity, a great mind, and you’re wasting it.  I’ve got no complaints if you honestly enjoy working with your hands, but I don’t think you realize that the working world is much more difficult than is shop class.  My advice, all I’m asking of you, is that you stay in school, pick up your grades, and at least WORK before you decide to be a worker.

Sincerely,

                Your dad.

Author's Note

Another essay from school.

Reviews

[Thomas Fitzgerald]

Highly intelligent and a unique way of looking at the total corroboration on the U.N. and the failures of most governments, well written, good read.

[Elizabeth]

This is one of the most intelligent commentaries I've read in awhile. My father and my brother have had the same conversation. You've done an excellent job of framing it as a two sided debate, point and counterpoint, though it is clearly a letter. I think there are a few extra commas here and there but this is really fantastic.