A lifetime navigating social classes

I was not born rich, nor was I raised into the high class society. My picture as a kid, age 3 years old tell the story and I always keep it in my mind… I remember my origins. 

All my life, I’ve tried to fight the social class that was assigned to me, sometime with success, many times with hardship, but in the end, I’ve discovered that social class is still alive and well no matter where you go, live and work, in the entire world. 

In fact, it’s always surrounded me, especially when I was in boarding school in Cluses, the social differences were striking, yet hard to grasp and understand. Therefore they stayed in my way. The military service is said to be a social leveler in France, but only if you know to navigate the class labyrinth well. 

Then, there was my short ski instructor career that gave me the illusion that I had a pass to jump and pick classes of my choosing. I was useful to some of my students, because of my knowledge of an environment that was foreign to them. This let me peek closely into their world and sometimes experience it for a short while, but in the end, it never made me part of their caste. 

At that point, I moved into the corporate world; first, with relative ease in France in spite of its rigid class system. I must have gained some good training as a ski instructor! 

Coming to America was a totally different story. Social classes were said not to exist here, but they were everywhere as a non-written, often hidden code. 

They were just threaded into the culture, and thank god, I was white! That was tough to see, decipher and understand. I struggled, did my best and probably faked it until it was no longer necessary for my survival, but it often left me exhausted and puzzled. 

This is why I’m convinced that there should be more than one class about social classes as we get formally educated!