Caste Clarified
I was recently called out in humor when an acquaintance of mine said that I use words like ghetto a lot to explain events in my life. I told him, "I try to relay the feeling of being a lower middle class person living in an upper lower class city with the goals of an upper middle class lifestyle and a dream of being an upper class elitist." Of course, this needs some explanation.
I live in Pontiac, Michigan, a suburb of the Greater Metro Detroit Area. It's about 30 miles north of Detroit. In fact, before living in Pontiac, I spend the first 10 years of my life in Detroit, which to most people, sounds like the beginnings of a thug turned superstar, rags to riches movie, or a horror movie, same difference. South East Michigan was once the epicenter of the automotive industry, it still has a great presence, but no where the impact it once did. So what this means is that where once stood great automobile manufacturing plants, now stand large empty buildings awaiting improvement, real estate reclassification, or demolition. This, of course impacts the economic well being of Michigan and whatnot, but that's a whole different story. Just know that where greatness once stood, now is ruin.
What this means to me, and many other gen X'ers in Michigan, is a sort of failed promise. We grew up in a school system that taught us that an education was the answer to all of our dreams, but a society that showed us that working at the plant was a desirable lifestyle, and both failed. If you chose to follow the path of education, you were fighting an uphill battle in the Detroit school system which is an urban disaster of corruption and wasted money. Detroit is losing thousands of citizens every year, which means less money, less taxes, and poorer school districts. Try telling a child who can barely speak legibly that he can be president some day. On the flip side to this is the dream of vocational work, those who chose to go into the automobile industry or related trades. This ended up also being a false promise as the job market is falling apart with jobs being shipped around the country and to lower cost manufacturing plants in other countries. Not that this is a bad thing, but an unfortunate side effect of big companies making big money. This however is no condolence to the person who chose this work path, which coincidently is basically an unskilled worker.
So where does this leave me? I'm an in betweener. I have enough education to keep me out of trouble, with just a few marketable skills. I fell into a few bad decisions as a teen and marked myself enough so that I can never obtain the American dream through traditional means, but we dream anyways.
Thus, "I try to relay the feeling of being a lower middle class person living in an upper lower class city with the goals of an upper middle class lifestyle and a dream of being an upper class elitist." Does that make sense?
I live in Pontiac, Michigan, a suburb of the Greater Metro Detroit Area. It's about 30 miles north of Detroit. In fact, before living in Pontiac, I spend the first 10 years of my life in Detroit, which to most people, sounds like the beginnings of a thug turned superstar, rags to riches movie, or a horror movie, same difference. South East Michigan was once the epicenter of the automotive industry, it still has a great presence, but no where the impact it once did. So what this means is that where once stood great automobile manufacturing plants, now stand large empty buildings awaiting improvement, real estate reclassification, or demolition. This, of course impacts the economic well being of Michigan and whatnot, but that's a whole different story. Just know that where greatness once stood, now is ruin.
What this means to me, and many other gen X'ers in Michigan, is a sort of failed promise. We grew up in a school system that taught us that an education was the answer to all of our dreams, but a society that showed us that working at the plant was a desirable lifestyle, and both failed. If you chose to follow the path of education, you were fighting an uphill battle in the Detroit school system which is an urban disaster of corruption and wasted money. Detroit is losing thousands of citizens every year, which means less money, less taxes, and poorer school districts. Try telling a child who can barely speak legibly that he can be president some day. On the flip side to this is the dream of vocational work, those who chose to go into the automobile industry or related trades. This ended up also being a false promise as the job market is falling apart with jobs being shipped around the country and to lower cost manufacturing plants in other countries. Not that this is a bad thing, but an unfortunate side effect of big companies making big money. This however is no condolence to the person who chose this work path, which coincidently is basically an unskilled worker.
So where does this leave me? I'm an in betweener. I have enough education to keep me out of trouble, with just a few marketable skills. I fell into a few bad decisions as a teen and marked myself enough so that I can never obtain the American dream through traditional means, but we dream anyways.
Thus, "I try to relay the feeling of being a lower middle class person living in an upper lower class city with the goals of an upper middle class lifestyle and a dream of being an upper class elitist." Does that make sense?
posted by Mikey at 9:05 AM
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