So very beautiful. I think awe is my favorite state of being and what a wonderful thing that your children are growing up with the knowledge they can both find and create it everywhere. ♥️
Thank you for inspiring me. It's a beautiful thing that you have kept your sense of awe and wonder through everything, although I'm not at all surprised.
Your devotion to whimsy is admirable and enviable! Your children are lucky!
Yet, I can't help feeling disheartened when self-proclaimed progressives who are clearly wealthy, as in top 1-2% in terms of income earned by you and your ex-husband, say that their children are living a "highly typical American middle-class life."
Do you realize that the median household income in 2019 was a smidgen north of $65,000?
And please don't think that the obligatory throw-away line about "privilege" provides the latitude to conflate being member of the top 2% with being part in the "middle-class."
Sorry to chastise. Love you posts! Just saddened to think that, yes, this is America, it's a place where the elite, the top 1-2%, truly believe they live "middle-class" lives and willingly proclaim it without an ounce of shame.
It's difficult to imagine how we as a community will ever solve the problems we face when the chasm between perception and reality is so immense.
I appreciate your post, and perhaps I should have written “upper middle class.” However, I am certainly not in the upper 1-2%, and I stand by the comment that my life - especially as a single mom who works for an impoverished K-12 school district - is a typical middle-class one. I know quite a lot about poverty in America, so I respectfully disagree with your assessment.
Fair enough. I stand guilty of hyperbole as accused.
That said, my sense is that you don't understand what a "typical middle-class" life is like in America today. Do you understand that "middle-class" single mom households have a median income of about $48,000? Not multiples of that. Just $48,000.
Can you appreciate that it is one thing to adopt a modest lifestyle *by choice* while possessing the euphemistic "upper-middle" class wealth and earning an "upper-middle" class income and quite another to be truly middle class and try to make ends meet on $48,000 per year while having virtually no safety net of accumulated wealth?
Similarly, please try to understand that knowing "quite a lot about poverty" and living in it are not the same.
Why not simply say something like, "My children are blessed to have two parents who earned advanced degrees from elite private institutions and, therefore, have been sheltered from many of the financial concerns and daily fears faced by middle-class Americans today. Yet, I have worked hard to instill in them an appreciation for moderation and to have them experience first-hand the joys of living a modest lifestyle."?
And thanks again for your posts! They are always thought provoking.
So very beautiful. I think awe is my favorite state of being and what a wonderful thing that your children are growing up with the knowledge they can both find and create it everywhere. ♥️
Thank you for inspiring me. It's a beautiful thing that you have kept your sense of awe and wonder through everything, although I'm not at all surprised.
What a rich world you create for your children. Magic made by Mom!
I want to live at your house!
imagination abounds on your ceiling & in your home!!
Wow! Your girls are so lucky to have such an imaginative and high energy mother!
Your devotion to whimsy is admirable and enviable! Your children are lucky!
Yet, I can't help feeling disheartened when self-proclaimed progressives who are clearly wealthy, as in top 1-2% in terms of income earned by you and your ex-husband, say that their children are living a "highly typical American middle-class life."
Do you realize that the median household income in 2019 was a smidgen north of $65,000?
And please don't think that the obligatory throw-away line about "privilege" provides the latitude to conflate being member of the top 2% with being part in the "middle-class."
Sorry to chastise. Love you posts! Just saddened to think that, yes, this is America, it's a place where the elite, the top 1-2%, truly believe they live "middle-class" lives and willingly proclaim it without an ounce of shame.
It's difficult to imagine how we as a community will ever solve the problems we face when the chasm between perception and reality is so immense.
I appreciate your post, and perhaps I should have written “upper middle class.” However, I am certainly not in the upper 1-2%, and I stand by the comment that my life - especially as a single mom who works for an impoverished K-12 school district - is a typical middle-class one. I know quite a lot about poverty in America, so I respectfully disagree with your assessment.
Fair enough. I stand guilty of hyperbole as accused.
That said, my sense is that you don't understand what a "typical middle-class" life is like in America today. Do you understand that "middle-class" single mom households have a median income of about $48,000? Not multiples of that. Just $48,000.
Can you appreciate that it is one thing to adopt a modest lifestyle *by choice* while possessing the euphemistic "upper-middle" class wealth and earning an "upper-middle" class income and quite another to be truly middle class and try to make ends meet on $48,000 per year while having virtually no safety net of accumulated wealth?
Similarly, please try to understand that knowing "quite a lot about poverty" and living in it are not the same.
Why not simply say something like, "My children are blessed to have two parents who earned advanced degrees from elite private institutions and, therefore, have been sheltered from many of the financial concerns and daily fears faced by middle-class Americans today. Yet, I have worked hard to instill in them an appreciation for moderation and to have them experience first-hand the joys of living a modest lifestyle."?
And thanks again for your posts! They are always thought provoking.