Reply #37: I would call it working class [View All]

[u4ic]

not middle, but not dreadfully poor. Money enough for the basics, such as shelter and food, but not for anything else, so we all had to share the bike, or the hockey stick. There was no money for dance classes, etc, so fun or hobbies were up to us and our imagination. Clothes were hand me downs, and it wasn't unusual to have 3 or 4 spots of mending on each sock.

My parents had been very poor during the depression, especially my dad, who lost his own dad when he was 11. There was 7 kids in the house and my grandmother was widowed at 30, and they were dirt poor before his passing. He didn't have life insurance or anything of the sort, and the kids often didn't eat, or only had bread and tea for days, and they had to share shoes.

I learned a lot about thrift and reusing/recycling from them.