Happy Monday, Internetland!
Good morning. Today is the one day a week that most people dread. Mondays mean back to work, back to school, and back to the grind that is our every day lives. If you’ve been following It’s An Ordinary Blog for a while, you know that sometimes, on Mondays, I like to share long, rambling complaints about a topic that pisses me off in a series I like to call “Mad About It Mondays”.
Today I want to talk about a topic that’s been on my mind for a while: Entitlement.
Millennial: (noun) 3. (usually initial capital letter) Informal. a person born in the 1980s or 1990s, especially in the U.S.; a member of Generation Y : Millennials are self absorbed, entitled jerks.
As an Older Millennial, I used to think that the biggest problems our generation faced stemmed from the behaviors of the younger crowd (who are just now in college and entering the workforce). I occasionally read blog posts about how millennials are lazy, self-absorbed, and entitled and I would think, “Certainly this doesn’t apply to 30-somethings”. Maybe my blinders have been on and I simply haven’t noticed these same behaviors that the media covers being exhibited by my peers or maybe it really doesn’t happen that often among older millennials…until, of course, it does.
To protect the not-so-innocent, I’m going to be very careful with my words here…I have a friend, let’s call her Sally. Sally recently took to social media to complain about a letter one of her neighbors anonymously mailed to her about her Lawn. The letter was friendly enough, a simple reminder that Sally’s house is the first house that everyone sees when they enter the neighborhood and a request to take better care of her lawn. Fair enough. Sally is a property owner, basic lawn care should be a given when you own a home, right?!
WRONG
According to the 54+ comments older millennials made on her post
“How DARE (Sally’s) neighbor sent such a RUDE letter,” they said.
“What an ASSHOLE,” they said.
“If THEY have a problem with YOUR lawn, they should mow it themselves,” they said.
“Yuppie suburbanites whose only aspiration in life is to become the HOA President,” they said.
“They need to mind their own business,” they said.
They said. They said. They said.
The comments went on and on and on all siding with Sally and her complete disregard for her neighbors. And it hit me.
Maybe older millennials are entitled asshats, too.
Was it a little shitty for Sally’s neighbor to send a letter through the mail so that they could remain faceless while complaining about her lawn? Maybe, I’ll give her that, but the neighbor has a RIGHT to ask her to take pride in the way her house looks.
The neighbor has a RIGHT to expect her to take reasonable care of her lawn so that their property value isn’t adversely impacted as a result. The neighbor, in my opinion, approached the subject in the most tactful (read: least embarrassing, for Sally) way possible and yet, even still, the neighbor is somehow to blame (according to the comments) for the situation.
Sally’s situation reminded me of a situation that I am currently facing (not that I need a reminder – I face it every single day). My own neighbor refuses to take care of their lawn and, as a result, it’s hurting the property values in our neighborhood which is going to directly impact me when I go to sell my house. Homes in our neighborhood aren’t selling for what they should be and that really sucks – It sucks for ALL of us in the neighborhood who manage to be responsible home owners despite being millennials ourselves.
Disgusting.
Adulting can be hard sometimes – I get that. Life is full of obligations and finding the time to fulfill all of your responsibilities can be hard. Nobody owes you the courtesy of overlooking their declining property values because you can’t be bothered to mow your damn lawn. Give me a break. Better yet, give your neighbor a break and get it together.
/rant.
PS- I should mention that it wasn’t what Sally said that inspired the post, it was the 54 people who thought that Sally shouldn’t have to take care of her lawn if she didn’t want to.
