A conversation with one’s own young, on the duties, obligations, responsibilities of parents, from a legal angle here, translated…
“Mommy, what are you reading?”, my younger child came toward my desk, saw that blue-covered, yellowed pages, diary in my hand.
“This was your grandfather’s diary.” I’d held back my tears, put it up in silence.
“When I was young, grandpa always told me, I’ll take you to Carrefour, RT Mart, bought me all those treats!”, my daughter got nostalgic.
this??? photo from online
Yeah! Mommy’s busy working, grandpa and grandma came to mommy’s rescue every time, and I’d needed them to come watch you and your older brother often.
“I loved going to the toy store with papa!”, my older son told, “I saw a limited edition Gundam that’s very expensive, papa didn’t have that much money, but I’d told papa that by tomorrow, it’ll be, gone! And on that very night, papa went and bought it!” my son has the potential as a scam artist, and I’m sure, that my father was, more than glad to get, cheated too.
“I don’t think I remember my inside grandpa and grandma at all!”, my younger daughter stated.
“what inside grandpa and grandma? Your paternal grandparents, my parents!”, her father laughed and straightened her out.
Because they got too old, and, God called them up earlier to be fairies, you were still, too young.
or this…
photo from online
So as mommy read through papa’s diary, she got sad. Especially how today is Father’s Day, I really hope that I can have that meal with my father, to watch T.V. together, to have this, ordinary sort of a bliss again.
My younger daughter hesitated a bit, ran to get a cup of tea, and, served it with great respect to her father.
And her father flipped through the papers, and let out a cool sort of “hmmmmmmmm!”, and I saw that smile, curling up his lips, he was now, gloating!
“there’s only one dad, you must, cherish him!”, my son is now, sucking up too, with a fan, fanning to cool his dad down, maybe, he’d not done well on an exam, and needed to put out his father’s fire before he’d shown the papers for him to sign.
There’s, that mix and match of emotions that’s between parents and children, sometimes, what happened was, more dramatic that the soap, more imaginative than those novels.
Remembered how we’d all gone to see that Japanese film, “My Accidental Father”? the gynecology nurse envied someone else’s happiness, switched the two newborn infants up. Six years later, the truth came out, how were these two families supposed to, cope with, this huge accident in their lives?
The two fathers, one was an elite excellent architect; the other, an electrician, who’s, easy going in nature. Which one would best fit the children to be raised in?
“What if, this actually happened?”, my younger daughter became worried.
The way the movie worked out, it’s, gentle and understanding. But in reality, the parent-child relationships, were based, off of the laws. There are the adopted children and the blood-related children in the facets of the law.
“Children should follow the filial piety duties toward their parents. As Civil Law 1084 stated.” Dad recited it aloud.
“Second, parents should protect and educate the underage minors”, mommy added.
You want to match memories? You’d forgotten to hold my hands first time we went out on a date, as we crossed that intersection; on our second date, you’d dozed off, started snoring; and, by the third date………………(deleted millions of characters here!)
Dad who was on his tea started choking on it, started coughing hard, and, escaped into the bathrooms.
“Mommy, there’s a sixteen-year-old daughter who’d sued her father, because he wouldn’t buy her a cell phone”, my older son thumbed through the online news.
“there are the fathers who’d sued their young for parental support, but the judge said the children didn’t need to pay it!”, my younger daughter discovered something as well.
Ahh, the stories mom heard and saw in court, last longer than the Arabian Nights!
There was a middle aged man who got in court and started crying on the stand, it’d made mommy want to lose it too.
“Mommy don’t cry”, my older son handed a tissue to me, “I thought only daddy can get you worked up, can’t imagine someone else had too!”, came my husband’s coughing from the bathroom again!
“what had happened?”, my children both got curious.
That middle aged man’s father left the family when he was a young child, it was his mother who’d raised him all on her own, him and his two other siblings, with only enough money for a rental stay, they kept switching in and out of their residences, forgot to go to the land offices to change their addresses. The three siblings took out the student loans, and worked part-time, get themselves through school, and finally, this middle aged man had his own family, started raising his own young, finally, he was able to give his mother a good life.
But, the middle aged man’s father suddenly returned, Social Services notified this man to go and claim his own father’s dead body.
“What?”, my daughter covered up her ears, couldn’t dare hear the rest of the story.
His father who’d only shown up as a registered name on his national identification card, finished his final passage of life in a nursing home. Before this, the Social Services sent multiple notices to his registered address, to let them know that they needed to pay for the owed fees of having his father placed, but they’d, already moved out, and through the searches, the Social Services finally found the three brothers and sister. Based off of the law, there’s the obligation for care, so the nursing home demanded that they pay for the money for their father’s care.
“But this dad had never been responsible at all toward his own young!”, my older son became confused.
During the time when their father went missing, the family didn’t know to report him missing, while their mother never filed for divorce either, let alone the children never knew they could file a petition to “relieve themselves of caretaking duties toward their father”.
“If the fathers didn’t care for their children when they were young, then he can’t ask them to take care of him when he’s old, is that what this means?”, my son inquired.
“Hmmm, it’s called ‘Without just cause not providing for one’s own children’, Civil Law 1118 section 1.” Dad finally showed up, replied, “every unfortunate family has a different bad story.” From before, the former generations said raising the children so they don’t need to worry about their old age, and now it’s, taking of the elderly years, watching out for the young.
“So, do we save the allowance you give us and pay you back when you’re older?”, my daughter asked.
Nope! Child. It’s the parents’ responsibilities, AND obligations to raise their young, same for how the children treat their own parents. This is not a sales or a trade-off, it’s not quid-pro-quo, tit-for-tat, nor trading the younger years, for that permanent meal ticket in old age.
But, we must admit, that in this world, there are, the unfitting parents, also, the bad children too. If this middle aged man’s father was found of not providing for his children when they were younger in evidence, the law must agree too, at this time, forcing the children to act kind, wouldn’t be just, or right.
“But this sort of cases are post-date. Meaning, that you must file a formal lawsuit with the courts, and after you’d won the case, then, you will be alleviated from paying for the care.”, dad got serious, answering the inquiries now.
So, the debts accumulated by this middle aged man before he died, for his care, the country believed that it’s paying for him temporarily, that in the end, this middle-aged man will pay for.
“But, what if you don’t have children?”, my younger daughter voiced her worries, she’d not planned to get married, or have any kids.
It’s, the million dollar question of elderly caretaking, and national social security, how the policies should be, set up all right!
Should the only reason for what constitutes as parents and children based only off of blood? And, the social security, is it an act of kindness, or a responsibilities for all of us, citizens to carry?
“Mom, stop worrying, you’ll get more wrinkles!”, my older son reminded me kindly.
It’d hit dad suddenly, he’d suggested, “Today’s Father’s Day, let’s go offer incense to both your grandfathers, and tell them we’re all very happy together.”
And then?
“Let’s have a gourmet meal, to thank me, as a responsible dad, of course!!!”, dad said, with that, affirmative tone of voice.
And so, this, is a discussion that’s, sparked up by the kids, and the parents are more than willing, to help the children get more educated, with their separate areas of expertise, and through this conversation shared with their young, both the parents and the children benefitted.
