Rich kids and poor kids

I was reflecting today on the modest upbringing I had, so I decided to list some of the differences between rich kids and poor kids in school. Now, I am not going for extremes..just the subtle differences. Also, "rich kids" as used below does not mean kids whose families actually had a lot of money, just kids whose parents spent more money on them.

Crayons
Rich kids always had the Crayola box of 64 with the "built in sharpener." I had K-mart waxy sticks, the kind that smeared on the paper in glops. The cool thing about the box of 64 was the semi-sparkly gold and silver crayons. Think the K-mart wax sticks had those colors? Heck no. I had to wait like a vulture, hoping a chunk of someone else's gold or silver crayon fell on the floor, then covertly snatch it up and drop it into one of the slots in my 8 pack that had a missing crayon. (I always got rid of brown because it looked poopy).

Lunch Boxes
Rich kids, if they didn't just pay for the hot lunches, always had the coolest lunch boxes, with cartoons or T.V. shows that were in prime time. Kids had B.A. Barakus or the Incredible Hulk or Knight Rider. I had a lunchbox picked up from a garage sale, so it was some show I never saw, like the 6 million dollar man or Kojak or something.

Lunch itself
Rich kids had hostess cupcakes, twinkies, and ALWAYS had a bag of frito lay chips. Rich kids had lunchables or slim jims, or cheese and crackers. Me, if I had chips, it was some generic brand, put into a ziploc bag. My hostess twinkie was usually an apple or an orange. No slim jims or cheese and crackers. Guaranteed I had a bologna sandwich, or if it was a good day, "cotto salami." You know, the spicy-looking lunchmeat. One benefit of being a poor kid is learning how to trade, although it was unfair trade. I felt like Bangladesh trying to trade with the U.S. "Um, I'll give you all of my generic chips plus my orange for one half of your hostess cupcake. Ok, you can scoop the filling out before I get it too."

Birthday presents
Rich kids got Nintendo games, Transformers. I got practical gifts, like socks, a coat, or mittens. Hey, aren't kids supposed to get those things anyway??

Shoes
Rich kids got Nikes. My nickname for most of my elementary school years was "Pro-Wings." Never heard of them? They were a payless shoe source brand who tried to be Pony, Puma, or Converse. I would have been happy with those brands, but I wore Pro-Wings like I had an endorsement deal with them. When I finally bought my first pair of Nike's, I rode my bike all the way across town, paid most of my paper route savings for them, then felt guilty about it for months, trying to conceal my extravagant purchase from my family for as long as I could. I still feel guilty about it. Still, it was worth not being called "Pro-Wings."

Television
Rich kids have a T.V. in their room. We had a family T.V., which always had a problem of one kind or another. We had one particular T.V. that, at random, wouldn't turn on, so you had to wait 30 minutes, or if someone messed up and tried to turn it on before waiting 30 minutes, an hour wait. How many countless hours were wasted in frustration waiting for that darn T.V. to turn on.

Eating out
Rich kids eat at all kinds of restaurants, and frequently. When we ate at a restaurant, it meant we were on the road traveling and someone forgot to pack a cooler of food (see lunch topic above), or it was my birthday, or we accomplished some major family goal, which reward was eating at a restaurant. Seriously, rich kids get sick of going to McDonalds. I can count how many times we went to McDonald's growing up on one hand. (If you see me today, you realize I have more than made up for missing out on Mickey D's as a youth).


Now, in all honesty, I wouldn't have had it any other way. Raising 6 kids is a financial burden for sure, and we were able to see most of the western U.S. on vacations, went camping a lot, went to parks and had picnics all the time. I was always proud that when we went on vacation, we actually crossed the Mississsippi river (I grew up in Illinois). I always felt sorry for the kids who went to Decatur to see their grandma, or went all the way to Chicago (a 2 hour drive) to see relatives. I had a Dad who played catch with me and my brothers in the backyard, a mom who took us to the library and made up fun activities for us, and parents who really let us use our imaginations and creativity. Can't complain about that at all. Plus, wearing Pro-Wings and eating bologna sandwiches for lunch built character.