Fifty Cups of Coffee #48: Cate Schotland
Date: December 30, 2024
Location: Home
How we know each other
Cate is my second child, and younger sister to Ethan. She reminds me a lot of myself at her age: interested in so many different things, wanting to change the world, and ready to see the world. She’s braver than I was at that age, and I’m so proud of her. I love her so much!
What Cate is doing now
Cate is a senior in high school, and is planning to go to university overseas in the UK or Ireland in the fall.
Three questions
During these Fifty Cups of Coffee chats, I ask each person the same three questions. The reasoning behind each is as follows:
Question 1 – Social media makes it easy for other people to think that they know us, when truthfully, we all only see a small sliver of someone’s life and who they really are. This is the interviewee’s chance to share something that is important to them that, for whatever reason, other people may not know.
Question 2 – We all have fears, no matter who are are or where we are in life. This helps connect us and show we are all more alike than we are different.
Question 3 – I believe the answer to this question helps show each person’s true values, passions, and their why in life.
There are no right or wrong answers to any of these. I’m including each person’s answers in first person. Their answers have been edited from my notes for length and clarity, but these are their words.
What is one thing you wish more people knew about you?
“If more people were aware of my atheism because I feel like there’s not as much of a community or space for that. There is a lot of support space for Jewish, Catholic, and other popular religions, and I wish there were similar communities for atheists.”
What is your deepest fear?
“My ultimate fear is death. Because I don’t know if people truly grasp what death is. It’s the ability to not think at all – your consciousness is literally gone, and you just stop existing. The idea of that scares me – the thought of not thinking anymore.”
If you had unlimited funds, what would you do with your life?
“I do want to help myself but I feel like helping the world would be better. I don’t want everyone else to suffer while I’m in my McMansion but it might create a chain effect that benefits me as well.
- It would take approximately $325 billion per year to alleviate world poverty so I would try to alleviate world poverty by giving more people access to education, raising wages, socializing healthcare, and creating social safety nets so people can fail without ruining their lives.
- Buy out every oil company and stopping production or close them down.
- TEAR THE MF FREEWAYS DOWN and build walkable cities and high speed rail in its place.
- Fund art projects and architecture projects on a larger scale.
- Buy out the golf courses and turn them into regular parks. Golf courses require so much water to maintain.
- I’d fund my college.
- I would pay off any extended family debts.
- Buy all the books off my wishlist.
- I’d want to buy an apartment or house close to the sea.
- I’d try to take trains to travel across Europe, and fly to Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Morocco, and Brazil.
- Fund research to find the cure for cancer.
- I’d buy games, vinyls, cameras.
- I’d be able to afford buying only sustainable clothing from small businesses.
- And most importantly, I’d support my family.”
Lessons Learned
I always enjoy my conversations with Cate, and I’m soaking them up knowing she’ll be moving abroad in a few months. Both of my kids are list-makers, like I am, so her bullet point-style response to the third question doesn’t surprise me at all. Here are a few takeaways from our conversation:
- Atheists unite! I was surprised at Cate’s first answer, but I 100% understand it. And I’m so proud of her for vocalizing it. We live in a society that is so overly religion-driven. Catholics, Christians, Jews, Mormons, and people who follow other main Western religions are definitely the majority and seemingly everywhere. But I very rarely see atheists and agnostics openly discuss or share their atheism/agnostic views. I’m agnostic but grew up in a very Catholic family. And even in the blogging world, people tend to support those who follow the same religion as they do.
- Gen Z is going to change the world. Cate’s response to the third question is very telling of her generation. She got me fired up! I’m so proud of her strong convictions and her courage to always vocalize her opinions, especially about matters of importance like the environment, inequality, and public policy. I’m so excited to watch her and Ethan’s generation because I really do believe they’re the ones who will finally make some major, lasting changes.
- Siblings are so often very different from one another, and it’s a beautiful thing. If you read Ethan’s answers and Cate’s answers, you’ll see obvious differences in their personalities. Most of my friends who also have two kids who are about 2-4 years apart say the same thing: their two kids are polar opposites of each other. While this definitely keeps us parents on our toes, I absolutely appreciate how different they are and hope that they embrace their differences, too. I love them both so very very much – exactly as they each are. I wish the world would appreciate all of our individual differences and see that there is no one way of thinking, being, or doing that is better or worse than the other. We are all important, and we all matter — exactly as we are.
Man, I love both of my kids so much. And I love their generation. And I’m so grateful that both of my kids agreed to be part of this little 50 Cups of Coffee project. ❤️
Thank you for participating in this project, Cate!
Follow 50 Cups of Coffee
Follow 50 Cups of Coffee on Instagram.
Visit my main website: Urban Bliss Life.
Learn more about me at MarlynnSchotland.com.