What Can You Do?

I'm about to leave the office after my first day of work, and my mom calls me crying. We sent a few thousand dollars to the Philippines to pay a loan, and the money's gone missing. Mom didn't wanna fork over the extra $50 for insurance, so now we're just hoping that the money turns up in the next couple of days... If not, my aunt and uncle (plus their four kids, and pregnant daughter-in-law) will lose their house. This is definitely not a game.

My mom and I spoke to my brother this morning, before I left for work. I'd heard her arguing with him and figured I'd play the good cop. After making her hang up the phone, I'd set a friendly tone.

"What's up?" I'd asked him playfully.

"I want to bring all of my books back home," he'd said, his voice terse from having argued with Mom. "I wanna bring books home then replace them with other books."

"That's a great idea," I'd said, "only you have a lot of books over there, and your Balikbayan boxes can only hold seventy pounds worth of stuff. We can't afford to give you more boxes."

His voice remained rigid and tight. "Then take out other stuff."

Never mind that the "other stuff" are foods and medicines for my parents.

My brother's been pampered his whole life. When I think back on us as children, I can't help but wince. Sure, our folks provided and supported us, but if they'd have had their way, we'd have been spoiled rotten. Thank God I had the clarity of mind at the age of thirteen to start working! My brother never had that. We've never asked him to work, and he's only ever had one job in his whole life. What's worse, though, is that he's pulled stunts that have cost literally thousands of dollars. Like the time he stole Mom's credit card and charged more than three thousand dollars worth of toys and video games and miscalleneous crap on it. Dozens of boxes kept on funneling through our door that day. I'll never forget it.

Most folks would have probably scared his ass straight with a beating and then sent back the merch; my mom cried uncontrollably and my dad consoled her by saying that he would help pay off the bill.

Since then, my brother's never learned how to control his spending - and every time he buys something, my folks foot the bill.

Now I'm leaving for work, and I have to laugh. Money's tighter than it's ever been, my brother (who's worn blinders his whole life) will finally be forced to realize that we're not as well-to-do as he imagines, and the pay at my new job is very-close-to-shitty. Still, I look on the bright side of things: I have health benefits, work's literally five minutes away from home, and the work itself is the usual clerical crap, which equals boring. Usually boring would bother me, but in this case, no one's cared to notice that I finished the day's work before noon, so I skipped out on lunch, spent the whole day blogging, and got to leave early. Sweet.