Looking up my Past

 My mother was weak, in a traditional way, even though she had many admirable qualities.  She didn’t work, she didn’t find relief in work, and her many activities that were not work did not net her any favor among men.  She did what was often lauded in her era, and yet she missed the boat about controlling her own life.  Because of that, I was handicapped.  I floundered myself in taking on gender roles.  I was female, so I supposed to take my cues from my mom, but she was so afraid of many things, and she had no power.  I loved my dad, and I looked like my dad, but I wasn’t my dad.  I also was supposed to move myself into the middle class, but all I really did was make myself an outcast.  I was only comfortable with my friends who were lower class, and I often refused connections with others.  I knew what I was:  I was halfway between lower class and middle class, doomed to be part of neither.  

When I became more middle class by education and marrying my current husband, I was never comfortable with it.  I was a sheep in wolf’s clothing.  Now I reside mainly with people who are wealthy but not classy.  They must be people who are lower class and proud of it. There is no in in between for me.  I am permanently between classes. 

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