A few days ago, I heard from my father that my older brother had been complaining to him about not having money to buy things. I asked whether Dad had given him any. He said he had. Since the renovation started, my brother has already taken twenty or thirty thousand yuan from the family.
A few years back, my family bought my brother a wedding apartment in our county town. At that time, his girlfriend was teaching at the county kindergarten, while my brother was working in another county about a hundred kilometers away from home. The girl’s mother had never been very supportive of the relationship. She felt my brother did not have a stable job and said they could talk about marriage only after he passed the civil service exam.
I remember they had been together for about three years. Later, my brother got into a state-owned company in our province. He had been working there for less than two months when they broke up. I still do not know the exact reason. Maybe it was the distance. Maybe her family still did not think the job was stable enough. After that, the apartment stayed as a place where my parents and I lived.
Last year, we decided to sell that apartment and buy one in the city where my brother works. Fortunately, the sale went smoothly, and we did not lose too much money. But a house in the provincial city is, after all, much more expensive than one in our county.
The new place was bought last year, and the renovation began this year. The furnishing and decorating part is mostly done now. But when it came to the heavier renovation costs, there really was no money left. The down payment had already been partly covered by my father, with the rest made up through loans. Almost all the savings my parents had accumulated over the years went into it.
Now both my father and mother are working away from home. Every month, whatever they earn goes straight into the house renovation. One apartment has drained a lifetime of savings from my parents.
From the time we were babies waiting to be fed to the time we reached thirty, nearly all our living expenses came from our parents. After thirty, maybe we no longer need them to pay for our daily lives, but when it comes to houses and cars, how many ordinary families can really manage without help from parents? Of course there must be some. But I feel they are a minority. Among people my age around me, almost everyone has relied on their parents in one way or another.
But of all the houses and cars bought with parents’ money, how many can parents move into as a matter of course? In the end, when they get old, do they not usually return to their own old homes?
Young married people nowadays generally do not like living with their parents. I include myself in that. Two people living on their own are free and unrestrained. No one interferes. Especially for married women, living with in-laws is often even harder. Daily habits, meals, routines—everything can be different. Conflicts are hard to avoid. If they are handled well, then fine. If not, someone ends up feeling wronged on both sides.
But when parents have poured their whole life’s savings into a house, refusing to let them live there feels unbearable too. It really is a century-level headache.
In the minds of young people of our generation, parents always seem to be our strongest support. Last night, my mother video-called me and said my brother did not have money to buy a bed. She had just received her salary and wanted to transfer it to him right away. I scolded her a little. I said, he is already in his thirties. He should find a way himself. Why does he keep taking your money? You still have loans to repay. If you give him everything, what will you use to pay the loans? You cannot just keep paying interest forever.
But by this morning, my brother had still managed to get the money from her.
Maybe this is the common weakness of all parents. As long as their children are short of money, whether they have it or not, they are willing to give everything they can.
As we grow up, we slowly become less dependent on our parents. At the same time, our parents slowly become more in need of us. This long transition is something every one of us has to learn to adapt to. Our parents can empty themselves out to support us. The question is, when the time comes, can we care for them the way they cared for us?