To say I grew up in a bubble would be putting it mildly. The summer I was 15, I realized everyone in my group of friends, including myself, would be spending some time in Europe during the school vacation. People lived in ridiculously overpriced homes for the luxu...ry of a small town feel, even though this “small town” included Aston Martin, Jaguar, Lexus and BMW dealerships. A trip to the adjacent town’s local mall, our regular hang out, meant a stroll by the always-packed Louis Vuitton and a vaulted and elusive Tiffany’s. I went to college in Orange County, California where my humble Nissan was always surrounded by a swarm of Audis and Lexuses, making me almost embarrassed to point out my car. Grad school saw me to New York City where I picked up extra cash nannying for adorable children of successful authors, doctors, lawyers and actors. While the families I sat for were never ostentatious or vomit-inducing about their wealth, it was always apparent when I took the children to gymnastics class and ended up next to a woman with a $10,000 Hermes bag. Sometimes, I would quietly listen in to conversations when I took the children to an Upper East Side eatery for homework and would overhear talk of jaw-dropping vacations and primary school tuition that rivaled what I already owed to New York University.
Even though I grew up around extreme wealth (my parents had family friends who would charter their own plane to Vegas whenever they had the itch), my family was never of the Chanel bag carrying, jet setting variety. But we weren’t poor either. We took regular vacations. Every driver in my family had a car. I paid for my undergraduate study without loans and I had made it through those coed years without having to work. By the time I was 25, I had been to Europe three times.
