Fifth grade. My parents were in some kinda of financial crunch, as usual. Only this time, their crunch came right at back-to-school time. So, no back-to-school clothes for 9-year-old Stephanie! I didn’t care that much, really. My parents promised me that a few paychecks later, we’d go shopping. So I put on my favorite year-old outfit and went to school.
Only to be ridiculed for not having new clothes for the first day of school. It only took a few mean comments from the other 9 and 10-year-olds to make me very, very unhappy. It was the whole shebang – kids whispering to one another while glancing my way, and then finally shoving one girl forward to ask “Stephanie, didn’t you go back to school shopping?”
I have no idea what my response was. If I had to guess, I probably got indignant and said “NO!” I didn’t like that girl very much, anyways. She was snotty right up until high school graduation, and I haven’t seen her since, but I assume she’s still snotty.
But this stuff sticks with you. I can’t read a blog post about back-to-school shopping without thinking about the first day of fifth grade, where I got made fun of for wearing my favorite outfit, simply because it wasn’t “new.” Any thoughts on what that says about our society?
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2 responses to “Random Money-Related Memory” 
Not so much our ’society’, per se, but rather 9/10 year olds. Kids are mean. Seriously.
True, Bri. But kids get the idea that you have to have new clothes ever year from somewhere, and it’s a combination of their parents and huge amounts of marketing. It’s now a monster that can’t be stopped.