Lunch proceeded as normally as a humble lunch between a filly and the most powerful alicorn in Equestria could, until it reached its near ending.
“Would you like to talk about your mother Scootaloo?” Celestia asked after Scootaloo had eaten her remaining hay fingers.
Scootaloo swallowed the last bite of her food and glanced around uneasily. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful Princess. I know that my mom works very hard and I know she loves me; I just wish I got to see her more often.”
“What does she do?” Celestia asked gently.
“She works at the weather factory in Cloudsdale, but we live in Ponyville because I can’t fly yet. So she has to fly forty five minutes to and from work every day and she works a lot of double shifts and late night shifts so I don’t get to see her very often and I just want to see her more and…” Scootaloo sniffled loudly as she realized that she was fighting back tears.
Celestia draped a wing around Scootaloo, hugging the orange filly. She didn’t say anything, opting to gently rock the filly back and forth until she felt the tears subsiding.
For all the actual magic that Celestia could wield, the power of touch was in some ways the most potent, and it had nothing to do with her being an alicorn. For Scootaloo it simply felt nice to be held by another pony. It didn’t matter that she was being embraced by the most powerful mare in all of Equestria; the only thing she was focusing on was that there was another pony who, at least for the time being, was there for her. It was a sensation she didn’t realize how much she was missing until she burrowed into Celestia’s coat.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I started crying,” Scootaloo said, wiping the tears from her eyes as she broke away.
“Why are you sorry? I was unaware that crying was an offense.” Celestia replied.
“You’re a princess, you have better things to do then listen to me complain.”
“Scootaloo, if I have the time to listen to two neighbors fight over lemons on a tree, I believe that I have the time to listen to a filly who just wants her to see more of her mother. You are a princess, it is important that we princesses support each other.”
“It is?”
“It is. I always make it a point to carve out some time for Luna, should she need it and she extends the same courtesy to me.”
“Oh.”
“If you were sitting in court and somepony told you what you just told me, how would you rule?”
Scootaloo pondered the question, looking at the ceiling as though it might hold some answers. Unfortunately it remained a blank slate of marble. “I..I don’t know. Could I make the weather factory pay her more so she could work a normal shift?”
“You could, though that might anger the other workers on her shift, and workers in other weather factories, and other ponies who would wonder why a weather factory employee gets paid more so she can spend time with her daughter while they toil on their own shifts.”
“What if I ordered that everypony everywhere should make more money?”
“That is a complicated question; trust me when I say that such a seemingly benign thing would create a lot of problems.” Celestia said, not wanting to get into an economics lecture.
Scootaloo thought some more, but was unable to come up with any other solutions that wouldn’t make other ponies mad. A part of her thought that it didn’t matter what other ponies thought, as long as she got to see her mother more often, but if the morning had taught her anything it was that Princesses should strive for some standard of fairness. “Well then what should I do?” she asked, looking up at Celestia.
“I do not know,” Celestia admitted. “For now you should enjoy your day as a princess, and I promise, princess to princess, that I will do what I can to help.”
Scootaloo heard those words from Princess Celestia and for the first time in a long while, she felt something that she might dangerously call hope.
I'd get her a transfer to a Ponyville weather job of some sort, at least that'd cut down on travel time. Then try and figure out what is eating up all the money she makes. If she's working double shifts to support herself and one filly, something else is causing it. House repayments maybe, perhaps a loan restructure is in order? Something like that.
5404201 Or perhaps, the workplace doesn't provide insurance, so she has to pay for it out of pocket.
now wait a second, just how expensive is it to live in ponyville? the average utility service worker(the closest I can find to match weather work) in the US at least who works hourly is 35.15 according the the Bureau of Labor Statistics(and I can't imagine that Equestria has much lower wages for essential services) and at a double shift every day, because scoots doesn't even see her on weekends, she is working 112 hours a week, and depending on the laws in equestria she might be paid overtime(at least 1.5 times the wage) which means she is paid, for her double shifts, at least the equivalent 3936 a week up to 5905 a week. and you're telling me that that's barely enough to make ends meet in a small town?
Sounds like it isn't as perfect in Equestria as it's always depicted in the show.
5404609 if it was writing good fics would be harder.
5404587 Do you really want me to breakdown Dizzy's finances? Or can you just accept the premise as I've presented it?
5405056 so full house ?
5404587 Well, we don't know what Dizzy Twister is spending her money on. Perhaps she's paying off a loan. Interest can make those things very expensive.
This is a fantastic read! I got to the last chapter and died a little inside because I wanted more! Keep it up and I can hardly wait for the next update!
5404286 ...Oh right, that's how things work in America isn't it. Why does everyone assume that Equestria doesn't have national healthcare? I mean come on, it sounds like something Equestria would have doesn't it?
5406620 Never said it was healthcare insurance. It could be something such as workers insurance, or homeowners insurance.
5404975 oh, i can accept them just fine, Lord knows that I've taken suspension of disbelief much further, I'm just surprised by how much things must cost for that to happen, of course she might just be trying to completely pay off her mortgage so that she can just not worry about it at all. It's completely fine for being presented from the foal's point of view since she wouldn't know anything about her mother's finances. I was just thinking a bit too hard about it, like I do with many things.
5406637 True, my apologies, when most people (in America anyway) say insurance, they're usually referring to health insurance. Yes, you may have meant any kind of insurance, but employers usually aren't responsible for those. They could be though, like income insurance, funeral insurance, things like that I suppose. So yeah, okay you got me there.
5406652 If your wondering, and I alluded to it briefly in one of the early chapters, Dizzy'a chief expenditure is a large mortgage payment. (In my head cannon her house is not quite underwater, but close. She bought it when Scoot's Dad was alive and the Ponyville real estate market was at it's height, also she foolishly got an adjustable rate mortgage, because there are predatory lenders in Equestria, add to that the cost of raising a child and maybe the idea that Scoots mom likes to spoil scoots a bit because she's away all the time and I think you can get to how she needs to work a lot to make ends meet without too much suspension of disbelief. If it helps you can throw in a gambling problem or something, though I won't be bringing that up.)
5405218 Ahem: So you're saying that if the Queen of England personally invited some kid from Wales to be Queen for a day, her mother's boss, upon hearing this, would not think along the lines of, "Hmm... if I don't give her mom off, I'll be vilified by every major media outlet in the country, and probably harassed by tax collectors and all manner of government agencies who could suddenly find all these little-known laws to make my life a living hell."
Like I said, when THE LEADER OF YOUR COUNTRY sends your immediate family an invitation, you basically get a free pass from work. No boss with half a brain is going to say no.
5406620 Because we've never seen any sign that they have national healthcare, maybe?
Indeed, we have no evidence they even have health insurance.
But then again, they may not need it since the wide-spread corruption and overcharging and lawsuits which have so radically driven up medical costs don't exist.
They may be like Nepal, where you can get cataract surgery for $250 cash.
5410271 Well, the times we see hospital scenes, no money changes hooves and no paperwork is signed. So I suppose it could go either way, I like to think that they'd have national healthcare though.
5410379 They also have national deathcare. Celestia deems when a pony is to die and writes it in her DEath Note!
I like to think they have that... (personal preference = justification!)
5408054 Well, the real estate market probably didn't stay the way it was when the house was bought. Dizzy Twister got caught in the Equestrian equivalent of the housing market crisis.
I have returned from my time away, now I can catch up on this story, I love the chapter.
I can’t it’s too funny