What's something a poor kid would understand, but would utterly confuse a rich kid?

Waiting around in a laundromat, the ultimate example of why it's so expensive to be poor.

You can't afford the initial capital of buying a washing machine, so you end up spending even more money at a laundromat over time.

Watching the rest of the class go on class trips or vacations while you stay at home or at work,

or even going to a school that offered this in the first place. I had no idea this was even a thing

until I was in my 20s. Every time you get a little bit ahead, an extra $100 or so, and being

able to relax and breathe a bit. Next day, something goes catastrophically wrong with the car or an appliance or an unexpected late charge on something you forgot about. It never ends. One step forward, two steps back.

The guilt versus gratitude relationship fight you have when your friends share their food with you, because on one hand, you never have enough money to buy enough food to be fully satiated. So that extra from your friends share their food with you because on one hand you never have enough money to buy enough

food to be fully satiated so that extra from your friends is awesome but on the other hand you

understand how awful it is to not have enough food at lunch and you don't want to put your friends in that

position going to the library to use the internet my mom and i often went with the car to the parking lot nearby outside with our crappy laptop to connect to the nearby unsecured Wi-Fi to be able to Skype with my grandma.

It happened for about a year until she had enough money to buy a router.

New means different, not unused. When you're getting new clothes, they're used from family or a thrift store. My cousins are

upper middle class and I went shopping with them during one of the only times I spent the night at their

house. Not only were these 12-year-old girls astounded that my mom only gave me $10 to spend while

there, they couldn't at all understand why I was checking the prices on everything

we saw. Their parents just bought them whatever they wanted most of the time. My entire identity

revolves around food. I use my spare fun money for food now. I give gifts of food. I take friends

out to eat. I give people their favorite snacks and candy bars as little surprises.

We never had enough as a kid. We went hungry every day. And now I express myself through food.

I'll bring friends dinner. I'll bake people's favorites. I'll bring my coworkers' entire casseroles.

I'll take huge pots of soup to our neighbors. I'm getting emotional right now just thinking about how important the availability of food is to me.

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