In every phase of life, there’s perks. At some businesses, that translates into free coffee. At others, a free parking spot close to the door. At others, the perks are a paycheck every two weeks.

Childhood has its share of perks, but we didn’t realize we held those cards until much later in life. The best perk childhood offers is ignorance of the meaning of mortgage payments, repairing a plugged-up toilet and going to sleep every night with the reassuring knowledge someone else is in charge.

But along with the perks came the powerlessness of having little power over your fate. For instance, breaking one of mom’s favorite possessions. Doesn’t matter if said knick-knack came from the dollar store or a garage sale, the minute a child breaks said item, it becomes Mom’s favorite followed by “this is why we can’t have nice things.”

We all remember that sick feeling in our gut. Worse was when Mom said “Just wait until your father gets home.”

For hours, our stomachs would be in a knot because we knew the wrath of the all-powerful father would come down on us like Thor’s hammer.

Then I got to be a teenager, and the perks I thought I’d have handed over to me, simply because I had the word “teen” in my job description, vanished. I thought I’d be able to sleep until noon, talk on the phone and then go back to sleep.

Instead, adult chores invaded my life, just as it did all other teens. There’s mowing the grass, babysitting the younger siblings and the worst, taking out the garbage. The perks of being a teen suddenly didn’t seem so wonderful.

And then we headed straight into adulthood. We thought we wouldn’t have to worry about homework, research papers or figuring out what to do with the rest of our lives.

Instead, we found out adults worry about paying the electric bill, cleaning out dusty air conditioning filters and figuring out how to get three children to a soccer game, baseball game and swim practice in one evening.

That’s over and above the free perks of getting gum out of a screaming child’s hair, removing the skunk stink from the family dog’s fur and disposing of mice, roaches and snakes that find their way into the kitchen.

And the adult perks never end. Adults hover over their darlings from the time they’re born until they reach the self-reliant age of about 15 because a parent who doesn’t pay attention finds themselves in heaps of trouble.

You finally reach retirement age and think that’s when you’ll have it made. They’re called the Golden Years, after all, so life should be a breeze.

The kids are grown and gone, the dog’s old enough to prefer sleeping under the dining room table to taking a walk in 100-degree weather and the trash generated by two people isn’t worth taking out more than once a week.

And what about those perks? The Golden Years perks involve hours in front of the computer to figure out how to file for Medicare. And then there’s sitting in a doctor’s office because of high blood pressure, tests to check your cholesterol, sugar levels and that pesky pain in your hip.

But there are positive perks – the unconditional love of grandchildren, not caring if you burp in public, being bold enough to argue politics and religion and, best of all, seeing the children you hovered over for all those years grow into responsible, respectful adults.

That perks beats free coffee and parking any day of the week.