I THINK that 21st century children and teens are often portrayed as the tech children.
I think that is true, considering I am always the one to ask when the computer stops working or I am always the one to offer a magic solution when you need to change your phone background.
So it is true that this is the technology age with the tech children, but I have not only grown up with technology, I have grown up with recession.
I know that the term recession is generally a pretty depressing term but I think that we could possibly put some sort of a positive spin on it.
Continued below…
Don’t get me wrong, growing up in a recession, generally sucks. Having practically no money generally sucks full stop, but any adult could really tell you that. From the teen perspective, it really changes things too.
I think that all teenagers cope with it in different ways, but I think that whatever way that we deal with it will define who we are in the future (I know I just went deep).
I know that I am only 15 and I know that the recession began in 2008, because I still vividly remember when it first hit. Obviously I was only nine and I didn’t really know what was happening.
What I did know was that when I asked for a new dress or teddy bear that it was not as readily available so to speak.
When I started crying, I no longer got paid off by various family members to be quiet. That no longer happened.
But, even though many temper tantrums did occur, I definitely learned a lot and I don’t think that I will ever regard money the same way again.
Firstly, I will now and ever shall be, a bargain hunter. I know that I still spend money when I go shopping – I probably do spend a lot of money. But when I do spend money, I much prefer spending it when there is some sort of reduction.
When wandering around a shop, you probably wonder why I take so damn long to decide what to get. Of course, some of that time is deciding which item of clothing will look better on me.
The other half is actually adding the prices all up in my head, and it is 100% true that if the item is on sale, I am ten times more likely to buy it.
I think that if the recession never occurred, I wouldn’t take so long in every single store and my dad wouldn’t refuse to go shopping with me.
Next thing would have to be my value on money. I don’t know if, before the age of nine, that I actually understood what money was. I always just had the opinion that when we ran out of money we could just print some more (I was just too hi-tech for money on trees).
Now, I know that you can’t just waste your money on endless amounts of sweets and fake money on those games I used to play, not that I play them anymore or anything.
I obviously can’t go into every single thing that I have learned from the recession, because I don’t actually know. I have grown up in it and it has shaped everything that I do.
I don’t think that myself and all my friends would purposely go out of our way to get the cheap cans of coke and packets of popcorn for the cinema without it. Nor would we constantly discuss how expensive things are.
Overall I don’t have a great understanding of the recession, I just know that at last we seem to be coming out of it. Although, I couldn’t be more happy to hear those words, a part of me is still glad that I personally learned so much about the value of everything – because of recession.
I think that all teenagers have grown out of any spoilt brat phase that we went through that bit quicker because of it, and I think that all of the things that we have learned are for the better.
So yeah, the recession totally and completely sucked, but you got to shed some positive light on things sometimes and I think that me not buying that really expensive dress the other day is a good thing…
I think.
• Read Zoe’s blog here and follow her on Twitter: @Zobo2042
