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Bloke,
I think it's very good of you to make an apology for what you consider, in hindsight, to have been a mistake. Seldom do we see this and it's, in my view, a mark of great maturity. It took me a long time to learn to apologize without any qualifiers, I always wanted to say sorry, but...Learning to apologize without qualifications came to me, curiously, when I worked in a wilderness program for delinquent youth and saw them learn, in their group culture, to apologize without excuses. I thought, "Well, if a 15 year old can do it, I guess I could learn to. It's been very freeing to just apologize and go on.

As far as the topic of young people being responsible, we all know some who aren't and aren't being taught to be. However, we still have some of the best and brightest college students and young workers and inventors, so some folks are raising their kids right. As to the issue of whether to buy things for your kids, I think it is very individual. My ex-wife bought our then sixteen year old daughter a $10K car about eighteen years ago, but the daughter took lots of babysitting jobs and worked very hard in school and the car made things a lot easier because she could drive herself to school and activities and pick up her younger sister, so Mom could stay at work. This daughter got scholarships to the local State University and went to school virtually free as well as arriving at college with several courses of AP credit. Again, her board was paid by pparents even though we lived in town because we wanted her to have the experience of living independently at school. This daughter went to the Peace Corps after college and then to Tulane Law School and is now a practicing attorney working for the local State Children's Services Dept. So I'd say it all depends on the kid.

Some parents would rather their children not work and concentrate on grades. Others feel the work experience is broadening, and again I think it depends on the kid. If a kid is studying instead of working and participating in lots of activities that are broadening and useful on a college application, maybe buying an instrument is a good investment. The OP had access to both a home and a school tuba and at least one of these was a Miraphone (I guess a 186) so he didn't really need to buy a tuba and buying something better than what he was playing would have been a $5K proposition. Hence some of the responses. I do think that some of Raghul's other posts here show he's a thoughtful and questioning young man who looks like he will do well.

Personal anecdote, I am acquainted with a young man with problems that delayed maturation. I won't pretend to know anything about it, on a clinical level, but at 18 there was very clearly something wrong in there. At 30, he's fine, really. Not perfect, but pretty good. It's too bad they aren't like wine, and you can't just leave them quietly in their bottle until it's their time.

bloke wrote:

Donn wrote:Personal anecdote, I am acquainted with a young man with problems that delayed maturation. I won't pretend to know anything about it, on a clinical level, but at 18 there was very clearly something wrong in there. At 30, he's fine, really. Not perfect, but pretty good. It's too bad they aren't like wine, and you can't just leave them quietly in their bottle until it's their time.

yup.
Ours is nearly 30.
We have been told by many that - by age 35 or so - a basic level of maturity is often reached. We're beginning to see the "4:00 A.M. hint" of the dawning of it.

Good to hear.

Bloke, if I connected the dots correctly, I accept your apology. I took no offense to what you had said, in fact, I totally agree with you. I was just stating the fact that almost every kid at my school relies heavily on their parent's financial aid. My parents have always thought that if I want a phone, I will have to buy it with my own money and pay for the bills with my own money and same with everything else except for clothes and food. My parents would NEVER buy me a car. Not even if I were an only child. But my parents saw that I was very serious about tuba and decided that it would be a good investment for college because I will be majoring in music. They also understood that I could not possibly fit a job into my schedule having A-hour (means I come 1 hour early to school before everyone else) no lunch hour and then I stay after school for about 3 hours for Marching Band practice. I would get home around 5, practice for 1-2 hours, do homework (2-3 hours not even joking) and then go to bed. Then when marching band season was over there was concert season. I had a total of 7 auditions in a span of 4 months. I spent almost every minute I could practicing so that I could do well on my auditions. When I wasn't practicing I was either eating or sleeping. On top of all of that my mom would get on me if I had an A- or a B+. I know that my generation is often seen as lazy but, I really try not to be and a job just was not a possibility for me this year- but there is summer and I am definitely going to get a job to save up for college. You didn't come too hard or anything- what you said was true and I agree.

hrender wrote:“The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise.”

― Socrates

How did that work out for ancient Greece??