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By Jasmyne Post
“Richified”
(adj. to be above the means of poor folk)
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs tells us that we will first fill our physiological needs; then safety needs; belongingness and love needs following that; then esteem needs; and finally, we will reach self-actualization. Anyone can understand models and theories, such as Maslow’s, that researchers have formulated through years of studying the mentality of those living in poverty. However, I have discovered that the best way to understand the mentality of poverty is to have been born into poverty and then be suddenly thrust out of it.
I was born to a fifteen-year-old who was living in government subsidized housing. I was raised by my grandparents in a trailer on a farm in Western Kentucky. Our income was reliant solely on my grandpa’s random side jobs until my grandmother began a job as a lunch lady my freshman year of high school. We received food stamps, were enrolled in Medicare/Medicaid programs, and were frequent callers of the Help offices around town. Growing up, I was always told that a good education in conjunction with a strong work ethic would be my only chance at a better life. I spent my free time studying and helping to raise my siblings. My view of the world was forged in a world without wifi or excess.
We had the same three conversations: what new struggle had developed within the family, how we were going to afford things, and what DVD we should watch. There were certain topics that were outside of reach for us. For example, I never discussed politics with my family growing up. We didn’t talk about books or music. Until high school, my music taste was curated by a collection of CDs my grandpa had found on the side of the road and gifted to me (s/o to whoever lost their copies of TLC’s CrazySexyCool and Jennifer Lopez Best Of.) When I was interested in a topic that didn’t fall in one of the three mentioned topics of conversation, I would be listened to but not engaged. My grandparents never talked about their childhoods or hopes for the future. We just lived in the moment. The moment that had not provided us with the proper education or world experiences to care about anything more than what we knew first hand.
Two weeks before Christmas of my junior year, we were evicted from the trailer I grew up in. By evicted, I mean a law enforcement officer informed us that we had to be out by that date and they wrapped our trailer in plastic and left it sitting on our property for six months. Up until that point, I had lived in a comfortable state of poverty. We had a place to live and we knew how to turn the electricity and water back on when the utility companies would disconnect it. After that period though, we moved in with my Aunt and I began to spiral. My Aunt slept in the living room so that I could have my own room, but somehow, I convinced myself that I was not home when I would arrive there at the end of the day. For that reason, I decided that it was a good idea for my sixteen-year-old-self to take charge of my own life and move to wherever would take me. I lived with my mom for a while and even spent a couple of months in my best friend’s guest room. However, everywhere I went, I had a feeling that I wasn’t in the situation I was meant to be in. My grandparents bought a 500-dollar trailer and drug it to our property and lived in it for weeks without electricity or water. Once they secured utilities, I moved into that home which I affectionately labeled “the shed”. I was so grateful to be once again without wifi or air conditioning. There was something about the taste of financially secure homes that I had spent the last year in that wouldn’t allow me to find peace.
With that, one can imagine how I felt moving to college. I had my own fully-funded side of a room in an honor’s dorm. My first-of-the-month culture never prepared me for full-access to food that was not my usual daily doses of Hamburger Helper. Facially, one might conclude that having all of my immediate needs met would have eliminated the piece of me who had been conditioned to be ashamed of my socioeconomic identity. However, the sudden security was jarring to me- primarily because I realized that it wasn’t new to most around me. Everyone was experiencing college for the first time, but not everyone was experiencing having a stable living environment for the first time in a long time. The simplest things, like having easy-access to a washer and dryer, took me time to adjust to. I was so grateful for my new situation, but I found it difficult to escape the guilt of moving to this level of security without my family. Going to college was not one of the three topics of conversation that my grandparents were equipped to handle, so I felt really alone.
On top of the new college experience, I was also now a mentored scholar. I had events that required me to wear business casual and business clothes regularly. Prior to college, over eighty percent of my clothes were hand-me-downs from my cousins. After the eviction, I began using food as a coping mechanism and I found myself in my first semester having to do something I had never regularly done before- buy clothes. My refund was small, and I had to choose whether to help my family or buy clothes for events. I was too ashamed to ask for help affording the clothes or learning how to shop. I spent much of my freshman year feeling embarrassed that I was not as put together as the other girls. Knowing them now, I know that I could have reached out, but I was only confident in speaking about three things and I was afraid they would judge me.
Each time I tried to discuss issues I had in college with my grandmother, she would always pull out her favorite word for people she doesn’t like- richified. If I had a problem with a professor, it was probably because they were richified. If I wasn’t making friends, it was because all of the people were richified. If I didn’t like some new food I tried on campus, it was because it was made for richified people. I have recently realized that richified is not a real word, but it sure does have a real meaning. Richified is an adjective that is used to refer to something or someone that is out of reach of poor people. Richified things and people are not actually any better than poor people or what they can afford, but they seem like it. As mentioned several times, we only talked about three things in my household. Those three things were the only things that we had the time or resources to talk about, everything else was richified. Only richified people had TV to watch the news. Only richified people went on family vacation. Only richified people went to college.
The summer of my freshman year, I moved to Washington DC to work for the Library of Congress. I have never been to a more richified place than DC. The closest store to me was a Whole Foods and everyone wanted to talk out every elite opinion they had the privilege to develop. I loved being in DC, but I also have never felt more out of place. For the first few weeks in DC, I really struggled. I had been working for months trying to save enough, but the beautiful apartment that my roommate and I chose left me unable to afford to go out which essentially isolated me from making friends. The first paycheck I received in DC was helpful, but I knew that I would have to pay back the loan that I had gotten from a family member to afford the apartment, so I sought to conserve funds whenever possible. I spent most of my time in DC going on walks for hours each night after work, taking in the magnificence of the city I was privileged to call home for a while and talking on the phone with my grandma about the same three unrichified things that I was used to.
My dedication to paying back the family member who loaned me the money ended up being a smart investment. Once I returned home, that person informed me that I could wait until after law school to pay them back. That meant that for the first time in my life, I had more than enough money. I was able to buy clothes, go out with friends, and not pick up extra shifts at work without feeling guilty. When I went back home, I was able to take my siblings on fun outings without glancing at the balance of my checking account first. I went to concerts, picked up a few hobbies, and was even able to make a down payment on a car so that I could give my old one to my grandparents. For the first time ever, I was financially secure. It was a dream in every aspect except the fact that I now had earned a title that I had learned to despise. I was richified.
Currently, I am typing this blog with my richified nails. I am three semesters away from graduating with my richified degree and I will go on to lead a richified life. I can talk about more than just problems within my family, how I will afford things, and what DVD I would like to watch and I will be surrounded by people who will listen. I’ve worked hard to reach this point in my life, but I can’t help but try to do everything I can to prove that I am not a richified person. I try not to talk about my experiences in college with my family, because they do not fit into the big three topics of conversation. I try to resist the urge to buy things I can afford and want but don’t necessarily need when I know that my family will find out about them. I wish I had a better conclusion that would provide a solution to my current dilemma. However, all I can think of is that I wish that there was a way for me to learn how richified people think. Maybe then I would be able to understand better how to reconcile the fact that I have so much when my family is still struggling. I would learn to change the meaning of richified to mean “I made it” instead of making me feel like I have somehow further isolated myself. I am so grateful for everything that has happened to me in college that has brought me to this point, but I wish to articulate this feeling in case any other newly richified students feel the same.
Jasmyne Post is a McConnell Scholar in the Class of 2021. She is studying English and political science at the University of Louisville.
Commentary presented here is not necessarily a reflection of the McConnell Center. Thoughts are those of the author.