Just because a confidence isn't whispered ...
doesn't make it any less of a confidence.

Back story; my dad is one of eight kids born on a Glaswegian sink estate to a washer woman in the 40s. His childhood was four kids to a bed, cabbage soup for supper and 'one bath on Saturday to be clean for the Sabbath whether you need it or not' kinda poverty.

He and three of his siblings migrated to Australia in the 60s to seek a better life. They found a white working class man’s paradise. Good work, decent schools, cheap beer and smokes.

I am the family rebel. I am the first and only of my extended family to go to University. I got a great job, married a nice fella, had my kids in wedlock and don’t have a single tattoo. On the scale of Chavness I am an Epic Fail.

I moved back to Old Blighty 15 years ago and thought I’d introduce myself to my Glaswegian cousins. Sadly, I found that the kids of the siblings who stayed in Glasgow were living on the same estate as their folks in a slightly elevated level of poverty than that which their parents endured.

Like most working class Glaswegian extended households, my Clan is ruled with an iron fist by a fearsome Matriarch. She’s a 2 pack a day ex-mental health nurse. If she ever met Catherine Tate’s Nan, she’d spang her round the back of the head with her oxygen bottle. She’s well ‘ard.

I was round at her house one day when my 15yo cousin announces that she’s pregnant. To my surprise, the womenfolk were all ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ and ‘well that’s a good way to leave home’. No questions such as; ‘Who’s the father?’ or ‘Are you sure this is what you want?’ or ‘What about school?’. I sighed and kept my disapproval to myself.

The conversation rolled on and went to put on the kettle. I returned to hear my 15yo cousin moan 'I suppose I'll have to quit the fags now'. At this point the Matriarch pipes up. 'Don't you believe any of that shite love! I smoked through all my pregnancies and never had any bother at all.'

My bullshit tether broke.

'Really? All four of them?' I said into a room containing her THREE adult children. What was I thinking?

The conversation stopped dead as icicles started to form. The red hot glare of hatred from the Matriarch made it clear that I was never to darken her doorstep again.

I learned that day that Aspiration, the expectation that your children will do better than you, is a peculiarly middle class thing.
(Que?, Tue 28 Sep 2010, 6:06, 5 replies)

Nicely written
Have a click
(Smale is stuffed, Tue 28 Sep 2010, 8:05, closed)

Nicely done.
Clicks.
( Blind Meach Cautiously optimistic, Tue 28 Sep 2010, 9:50, closed)

I'd say you did the right thing.

( jim_bob can herd cats., Tue 28 Sep 2010, 15:05, closed)

Good show
Weegies really do rank among some of the most ill-informed opinionated small minded buggers going. Anything that upsets their parochial world view gets a click.
(mymilkshakebringsallthemongstotheyard poison hearts, poison minds - joining hate, Tue 28 Sep 2010, 17:24, closed)

i know it's stupid and snobbish
but if i had family members like that, i'd pretend we weren't related. i don't like people pissing in my gene pool.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Tue 28 Sep 2010, 18:58, closed)