Many teenagers heard the same lines and phrases from their parents as they grew up.
“My mom would always say, ‘Because I said so,’ even when I just asked a simple question,” Laniya Day, junior, said. “It never mattered what the situation was.”
Some students recall the warnings their parents repeated almost daily.
“Every time I left a light on, my dad would yell, “Do you think we’re made of money?” Kervon Tolliver, junior, said. “I swear he said it at least three times a week.”
“If I touched the thermostat, my grandma would always say, ‘Don’t touch that unless you’re paying the bills,'” Marckayveon Martin, senior, said.
“My mom would tell me, ‘If you keep making that face, it’s gonna get stuck like that,'” Au’triah Harris, junior, said.
For some, the lines came with guilt and humor.
“Whenever I argued back even a little my mom would say, ‘I bought you into this world and I can take you out,'” Zariya Moon, sophomore, said. “I knew she was always joking, but she said it a lot.
“When I complained about chores, my grandma would say, ‘When I was your age, I was doing twice as much,'” Jaylen Brown, junior, said. “She made it sound like she grew up in a survival show.”
