Sometimes You Have To Put Your Mouth Where Your Money Is

(Every year, my brother and I go home to our parents’ farm where we grew up, and every year, I hear jabs about my education. I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts; my mother has a PhD, and both my dad and brother are engineers, my brother with an added Ivey business degree. They have nine years, seven years, and eight years respectively, while I only attended university for three years. Once again, my lack of education is brought up and I finally snap.)

Me: “I make over $8,000 a month in my chosen field while [Brother] hasn’t used any of his education and needs you guys to pay for his plane ticket home to visit.”

(They were genuinely shocked, as I’d been hiding my income so as to not stand out from them who had all always struggled for money. They had been so derisive of my artistic line of work that it never occurred to them that chasing my childhood dream wasn’t a bad path to take.)