Apparently We Were All Poor

As a child there were just certain things you didn’t question. Your parents would tell you the situation and you would be like “Who am I to assess the validity of that statement? I’m a child with apparently incredible vocabulary in this instance”. Well now that we are not children I am here to tell you one thing – apparently we were all poor. And blithely unaware of this fact.

Toys

Do you know how much a Barbie is these days? Five doll-hairs. Do you know how much a bike is? Like 60 bucks if you get the cool beads that come on the spokes and the basket. I was under the impression that these items were made entirely out of conflict diamonds. My sister got my dad’s old road bike and he spray painted it sparkle purple to make it girly. 

I got my mom’s old Ken doll who definitely had real human hair I’m pretty sure. What was happening here? Also thank God my dad was MacGyver because the only kite I ever flew was made out of sticks and wrapping paper. And worked like a charm.

School Projects

Every school project was the same. First of all, you were going to need a trifold board. Because how in the actual world could you possibly present something in any other format. Am I the only one who had to re-use these things? 

I always felt like the integrity of my “Which Denture Adhesive is the Strongest” was compromised because not only did I have to display this on a used trifold it was, naturally, on a used trifold that my dad had made. It had hinges. It was covered in layer upon layer of previous projects, and it was a hand-me-down from my sister who was 7 years older than I was. If that’s not going green, I don’t know what is.

Printing

The only way you could possibly make your trifold even come close to winning an award was to use Word Art. The risk here for me was that colored ink was harvested from the tears of the dodo bird, apparently, and we can’t be just willy-nilly printing our faces off. 

Was I allowed to print my word art titles? Sure. In black and white. Also, good luck with your typo. That’s not a reprint, that’s a job for white out.

That’s the Same thing….

When I was growing up, Adidas all stars were the coolest. I wanted a pair sooooo badly, but they were way too expensive at a WHOPPING $30 a pair. Especially for shoes that now, quite frankly, look like something a podiatrist would prescribe for plantar fasciitis. You know who made the “same thing”? Payless. Did they? Or did theirs have 4 stripes instead of 3. At least let’s just agree that it’s not the same thing. 

You know what also isn’t a pair of JNCO jeans? Lee pipes.

At the end of it all you know what actually happened? No, we weren’t poor. We were kids, and kids are money sponges. And our parents were not interested in spending $80 on a pair of jeans to make us look like Gumby, or buying our stupid “projects” a $7 piece of cardboard every time. I one time made a tri fold about why I should be allowed to be called “Liza” instead of “Ainsley”. The Wild Thornberries was one of my explanations. That’s stupid. I don’t blame my parents at all.