I was that annoying kid always asking why. I grew up in a typical household in the 60's/70's - Dad was the breadwinner and Mom didn't work outside the home.
My parents were young and we always struggled. I remember my parents scrounging change from the couch cushions and gathering up the empty coke bottles for the return in order to splurge for hamburgers at Mickey D's.
My Dad worked hard and eventually got a job in sales which suited his "billy bob" style of glad handing and back slapping which worked out very well for him in the 80's.
Typical evenings at our Texas dinner table consisted of my Dad telling the latest N-Joke or telling us how close we were to having to stand in the welfare line or get food stamps & did we realize how much this fried bologna and potatoes cost?
On the other end of the table was my Mom. She was depressed most of my childhood and wore the same two pair of polyester pants day in and day out. She sewed a lot of our school clothes when we were little and while they weren't the latest fad, at least they provided us with a few options and we were young enough that the school kid's taunts weren't too brutal.
She loved to read and while my Dad would make us feel small my Mom would talk about poetry and the constellations and take us away from the mundane. Music wasn't important to my Dad. But my Mom enjoyed it, especially Bob Dylan and Cat Stevens.
She was powerless. She didn't even learn how to drive until she was 30 because in the small Texas town she was raised in, her Father didn't think it was important for women to learn. She loved Dick Cavett and thought the world of Gore Vidal.
She had to take all of my Dad's BS because economically she didn't have options and had three little kids to think about. Had me since she was 16.
If you spilled the milk in my household, you would think the world just came to an end until Mom would secretly blow you a kiss behind Dad's back.
So, I guess it's obvious who I related to.
Yes, I was that annoying kid always asking why...and I have never stopped.