re: What did “being rich” mean to you when you were a kid

A brick home, a TV with a remote, central h&a. Grew up without any of those until I was in jr high, I was turning the antenna, sleeping under 6 quilts, & scorching my jeans on the stove until I was 13 I guess. Even at that I was 1 of 2 kids in my class (less than 20) that wasn't on free lunch at school, so they probably thought I was the rich one.

Boat/lake house.

When you high school buddies take a boat out you think they rich AF

in the 70's, I thought it was those people that lived in those grand houses on the battery in Charleston SC. Never knew any of them.

We weren't poor but
- never took vacations, just camped at the lake in a tent
- i bought my first car, paid for insurance, gas, clothes
- worked for any spending money since i was 12
- Dad was frugal...could fix anything...remember trying to sleep at night in the summer while he was waiting for parts to fix the AC
- didn't have a pool but the typical 1/4 acre backyard was mostly garden...parents grew as much food as they could and put it all up

Never new any "rich" folks until i moved to Natchitoches Parish in 1979, where I met baws whose folks owned 2,000 acre cotton farms, people that had houses and docks on Cane River Lake, owned businesses in town, lawyers doctors and professors kids. This blue collar kid learned about the vast divide between the haves and havenots.

Having more than one pet.
Then we visited cousins in Illinois and they had part of a lake for fishing but not for swimming, a whole lake for fishing!
The a lawyer neighbor took over settling an estate near D.C. and everybody (grownups) started talking about how he was getting rich handling their estate as he slowly found relatives to inherit it from them.

Going to Europe every summer and Vail every Spring Break. My buddy's family was loaded.

We lived a more normal upper middle class lifestyle although I was in my early 20's when I finally realized that everyone didn't pay cash for new cars. I didn't even know financing a car was a thing

Your dad made 6 figures. Now 6 figures doesn’t go very far.

Having an Impala instead of a Bel Air.

People who went on vacation. I never went one one vacation with my parents unless you count a 1 day family reunion 20 miles from our house.

I didn't go on a vacation, like a few days out of state till I finished college.

air conditioning

color tv

5- 20 gauge shells to hunt ducks in the morning

First it meant having a color TV, then it became a car, both for the fam, way to young to drive.