NYT Chapter 10: The Five Bedroom, Six Figure Rootless Life

This article describes the life of Kathy Link and her family, who are termed as 'relos' (from the word 'relocation/relocating') because they belong to a larger group of families who are constantly on the move due to the breadwinner(s)' work demands. These families are do not stay for long in one place before they are constantly being deployed by their company to another, thus their spouses and children who accompany them have a 'rootless' life as well.

The article also details some of their struggles. The first part of the article details the way they have to adapt to the lifestyle of the neighborhood they are in, thus they take up sports, volunteering and other popular social activities in their efforts to join the "homogenous groups" in the neighborhood. However, this is taking a toll on Link as, in her eagerness, she has over-committed to too many activities, not to mention that she has to drive her children around for their classes, take care of them and monitor their schoolwork. She does not feel happy as she is such a busy woman, so busy that she needs all her amenities around her which their current neighborhood does not provide with its isolation.

This was what she eventually got as the second part of the article tells us about their move to a new neighborhood with another upcoming relocation. This part of the article talks about how the family was worried that one of their daughters would not take the news of the move very well as she had settled in nicely at their current neighborhood and had found her niche there. However, when they broke the news of the relocation to her, her reaction ("I hate you ... when?") was hardly as negative as we would expect, even showing signs that she had expected it and was probably immune to it already. This provides us with food for thought on how parents' lives strongly determine their children's and they are key in shaping their children's experiences and thus outlook in life.

One thing the article reinforced was that the umbrella term of the 'rich' does not comprehensively capture different kinds of 'rich' and their corresponding lifestyles. Notably, the 'relos' discussed in the article are employees whom Marx would label as oppressed and with poor working conditions. Yet, we can see that they are far from that as they are considered the top executives and are thus highly sought after, being able to command top pays that allows them to lead extremely privileged lifestyles.

Also, the article shows us the importance of neighborhoods in determining one's lifestyles. Because neighborhoods are related to other aspects such as work and education, we can thus see how the different aspects/kinds of inequalities work together to reinforce social stratification.

Another term I came across in the article which I found interesting was the concept of "architectural bullying". This term was used to refer to a kind of "illusionism" (converting one's illusions to something that has value, eg. houses, to impress others). The 'relos' in the article weresaid to employ the use of home designers and developers to build houses "that look like they have history"to demonstrate their long-standing status when some of them, such as Link and her family, are newly rich.