Letters to the Editor
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something feeshy
it seems like you should already know about your boyfriend's priveleged background, etc. and, as others have already said, maybe *he* isn't the one with the money after all. but privelege is a big thing, and even if he doesn't have money now, you say he's had a very priveleged upbringing. maybe you seeing proof of that has brought things you already knew about him into sharper perspective? i'm guessing it may be illuminating behaviour and/or attitudes that you've seen before, but are now seeing in a different light. this is really big thing that you've got to talk about and be okay with. and you might not. i, for one, have a really hard time being close with many otherwise wonderful people because their view of the world is, at it's core, just so alienating and hostile to me. sounds dramatic, but it's a big thing to have to deal with. talk to this guy about his money, and whatever else about the money is bothering you. you need to be ok with this. hopefully he is intelligent and compassionate and deep and can understand you even if he hasn't exactly been in your shoes, but that's something you need to find out!!
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There is another problem here...
I think it is pointless to try to squash your feelings of resentment. Whether logical or unjustified, you feel this way and you can't really talk yourself out of it so you need to work through it. I think Cary's "conversation" with him is a pretty good approach.
Here's the thing, though. How are you at a point where you know enough about him to commit your entire life when you had not even heard about his background before? Most people have heard where someone went to school, what they did for family vacations, what their parents are like (usually have met them), whether their grandmother was famous, etc. before they get to the point where they are talking marriage. You tell your story, he tells his story and you both expand on that through little anecdotes and big, soul-baring discussions.
Heck, I know at least most of the things I mentioned above about my co-workers and I have absolutely no interest in committing the rest of my life to them.
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what do i know?
Only that this is a confusing subject, fraught with secrecy. It's not surprising you don't really know what your fiance has. The first thing is to notice that you don't know, and don't make assumptions. And find out what reality is before deciding on your next steps.
Cary's advice is good. My only caveat is that taking on the life of the partner of a wealthy person is more difficult than it appears. I am not rich, my family is not rich. But I have some very very rich relatives, I'm blood related to slews of the very high class (polo ponies, not just swimming pools) and some of my closest friends etc. My dad left his class for political reasons, so I have blood connections but I don't have money. (Just so you know, I despise the rich relations, because they always treated me like trash.)
So, I know these types. They are very insular. Just because you are marrying in, doesn't mean you're 'in'. Make sure they are welcoming NOW. If they're cool and you feel inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt - don't. Don't wait to get their cold shoulder after they're 'family'. Make sure you have the loyalty of your fiance. Don't for heaven's sake (this is important!) agree to walk away with nothing if you divorce. This is why: in every marriage of this kind that I have seen, the non-wealthy partner doesn't work or works at a reduced level. You will lose job skills, job connections, job readiness, and the like. A marriage to a wealthy partner needs to make up for that (and more). Even a relatively short marriage!!!
Finally, think hard about the bubble world of the wealthy. It's not a happy place. You will be separated from the mass of humanity. All the defense mechanism that people put in place to deal with that in my experience are numbing, isolating, alienating, exclusive, etc. What you get instead of a connection to ordinary people is security and luxury. Think hard about this bargain. It is much worse than it appears.
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Money Changes Everything
This is a real problem. It is not some perception issue on the part of the letter writer. It is a matter of class consciousness and that really has nothing to do with money so much as it does privilige. We can't easily get past that one.
I grew up poor, an only child, and my parents were quite unusual because they aspired not to remain poor. They didn't wish to be rich, but they wanted, in Southern parlance, to "live good." It means having enough, having what one needs, not having to worry about whether or not there will be food on the table, not having to eat chitlins and collards and calve's brains and kale except for nostalgic reasons.
They succeeded, in time, but there was a stretch when my father went through a period of "getting over" that kind of swept him up and he swept me with him into this social climbing scheme he temporarily entertained. It was disastrous for me, and left me, in the end, the ultimate angry young man. When we left the city for the whitebread suburbs I hated everyone and everything. I hated the faux liberals who laughed up their sleeves at us "hillbillies" and the poor black kids who lived just across the tracks from us. I hated the lack of alleys and the stupid suits and the cotillion and the country club my old man joined. I fell in with evil companions and then I fell in love with a girl (this is first year of high school - very dramatic, very traumatic) who was in a very similar situation in her life, and who shared a past similar to mine. We were both getting over and we were the sweethearts of everyone who seemed to be living vicariously through us. It caused enormous difficulty as we both tried to live up to our parents' hopes and dreams.
Almost a half-century later our friendship survives beyond our marriages (her one, my three) and we both "live good" but live simply and require little. It is rather strange to look back on how we evolved from poor kids to pseudo rich ones, and finally into adults who require very little except some dirt to dig in and a great love of nature.
The money lives on in other branches of both our families, but most of them just "live good." They get by.
There is a very clear difference between a life of privilige and one of blue-collar values and the need to actually think about where stuff comes from. It's not something either extreme can just set aside. It takes on a life of its own. It destroys marriages and it sets people against each other, down the road, in ways they connot even imagine.
This letter writer is on to something. She might well take Cary's advice - or else take a pass on this altogether, since it is such a difficult choice she faces, such a difficult path to travel.
If you've never been poor you cannot know how the well-to-do, the sufficient, let alone the filthy rich, look. They are not like us. They never have been. They cannot be.
The boyfriend in this relationship sounds, to me, as though he is pulling a Martin Sheen, living as though he's not well off, trying to capture the "poor experience." Sweet Jesus, I've seen this dozens of times, especially during the 1960's when there were so many hippies living in filth and panhandling while at the same time accepting their families' money and blowing it on stupid - and often destructive - items and activities. They never really knew what they were doing and now most of them have, as William Burroughs wrote, "fat stomachs and responsible jobs." Of course they do. How could they not?
If I sound as though I harbor a prejudice against wealth, I don't think it's true. I think my prejudice is against privilige, and that just happens to most often be a handmaiden of wealth.
We do everything the wrong way. This letter writer may be more awake than most of us. I hope she'll at least confront the issue and see what happens. I fear she'll be vindicated when it's all over.
Money really does change everything.