Spoiled. You can call me anything you want

But warning: you do not call me spoiled.

I mean you dont even know me.

you probably don’t know how hard my parents worked to give me everything that they dreamed of giving.

All the moments they missed, recitals they had to skip

All because they were trying to make me so-called 'spoiled'.

But wait; let me tell you a story:

Imagine me, a kindergartener all excited for

Our party we were having in class

Parents with cameras, children with their storybooks ready to be read

In front of everyone.

But look! There's me! I have my story,

But no parents with camera in hand.

Yes, maybe at the time you thought it was embarrassing to have your parents

There but…

Speak for yourself.

I would have given all my stickers and pencils and erasers and colorful highlighters

Just to have one parent walk right through that door at any. Given. Second.

Nothing.

So there I was, crying, jealous of all those children taking pictures with parents, parents physically there to praise them and not just say "Good job" that night

When you see them for 5 minutes before your bedtime.

For them to attend an event that I wouldn’t remember the next week…

But who was I to set my standards so high?

Fact: it has been more years than fingers on my hand

That me and my parents and my brother have had dinner together at that long glass

Ten-seater table.

Piled high with plates of expectations and a side of reality.

A table clear enough to see right through my childhood. 

But look, I don’t want any sympathy from any of you.

I just want to spread how important the American dream can mean to that boy and his family and that girl and her family who travel

From small towns in Iran. NOT I-Ran

Because they ran away to go through the education that they couldn't possibly get back home to become doctors and be pushed around and provide the life for their children that they may not have had the privilege to have.

So yes, I'll admit this,

I may have a lot of unnecessary materialist shit

That my parents think make up

For the 8 childhood years they’ve missed. 

Because I know my parents worked hard and took calls to provide us with all of this… physical or not….

all for this so called 'American Dream'

SO I ask you this: think again before you call me spoiled.