I grew up in a working-class family. My mother’s family were farmers, and my father’s father owned a bar.
In elementary school, I chose to play the violin, and my parents called me “uppity,” a word I had to look up in the dictionary.
The violin was one of the musical instruments offered at school, so I didn’t understand why my parents objected, but they did. My violin playing did not last long because of my parents’ unrelenting criticism whenever I practiced.
In junior high, I became friends with some kids from the next neighborhood who played tennis, and I started to play. That, too, was labeled uppity, but by thirteen, I was inured to my parents’ criticism.
After high school, though, when I was working as a secretary at a community college, I had a moment of insight into my class status.
I had said something to one of the professors and he responded, “That is so crass.”
Just as I had with “uppity,” I looked up “crass” in the dictionary.
If uppity meant I had too high an opinion of myself, crass meant I was low-class or no-class.
I thought of myself as working-class, so crass resonated with me much more than uppity ever had.
But I knew he had used crass as an insult, that somehow my working-class background—and what I had said—were offensive to him.
It was the first time I really saw class distinction at work. I felt judged. From then on, I tried to pay closer attention to how my colleagues talked, and I practiced speaking like people who had not grown up in a neighborhood like mine. I learned what was acceptable to say among friends and work colleagues—and what was not.
Just call me Eliza Doolittle.
To be honest, I resented having to change to be acceptable. It felt disloyal to my background and perhaps even dishonest. I was pretending to be someone I wasn’t.
But once I had gone to college and was no longer working as a secretary, I began to lose my connection to working-class people. Even though I still lived in a working-class neighborhood, my education and income had moved me into the middle-class.
Working class is not usually aspirational because it generally involves hard work, long hours and low pay. But my childhood memories are filled with family gatherings and parties—raucous affairs that went late into the night, with food, alcohol, music and dancing. My family and our neighbors partied with abandon, unapologetically. They worked hard, and they played hard.
I am drawn to art that portrays common people celebrating life events and people doing the hard work of everyday life because it resonates with my experience of growing up working class.
Not all my working-class background has been obliterated, though, and I can still sometimes feel like an imposter. Occasionally, something crass slips out of my mouth, and I resist the urge to apologize, because it is a link to my roots.
Madeline Bialecki 
Interesting, what connections people have in their minds to different cultural expressions. About the violin, I immediately thought about gypsies, whom many people would think of as among the lowest classes, yet they are lovers of the violin and I think know how to play it.
Interesting observation about the violin. I think of the violin (fiddle) and Appalachian music or folk music. My people were more into accordion music (and polkas). Thanks for reflecting/commenting.
Your roots are showing, Madeline, and they’re beautiful.
LOL, Mitch. Unfortunately my roots–and the rest of my hair–is now gray. No more covering it up! I embrace it. Thanks