Things you thought were normal if you grew up working class

[Anycrispsleft]

Inspired by that "thought it was posh, turns out it wasn't" thread, I wondered if anyone else remembers stuff from a working class childhood that you thought everyone did and actually no it was just us?

Mine is playing with stray dogs. I was an adult before I realised that approaching strange dogs is meant to be dangerous. In my estate there were two strays (and one owned dog that would escape his garden) and they would chum along with us when we were out playing. We'd feed them crisps. (Luckily for the dogs I think we figured that crisps were more appropriate food for dogs than chocolate, as they were more salty and a bit like meat.) It would never have occurred to us not to befriend any other creature of the street. There was precious little else to do, why wouldn't we add a dog or two into the pack?

@UntamedWisteria

I bet none of you on this thread is younger than 50!

I am well under 50 Unfortunately poverty is v.much with us As is overcrowding, free school dinners and daily grind

@parkheadparadise No word of lie we had 2nd hand but my ma made us tell our da it was shop bought
Mum Taking sachets of sauce,salt,sugar when in shop cafes. Quick whoosh into bag
Everything being value label
Not knowing anyone with a bought house

Having to go downstairs for the loo.

Having hot water bottles as no central heating.

Having a coal man deliver coal into the coalhouse, which was in a cupboard under the stairs inside the actual house.

Mum always made cakes every week we were never allowed shop bought ones.

Sacks of potatoes being delivered in hundred weights.

When we went to seaside usually on Sunday school trip.me and my sister spent hours going along beach collecting discarded Corona lemonade bottles to get the sixpence deposit back.

The rumours about the teenage girls the other end of the street who had their dads babies

No one doing anything about it because the family were scum

Key on a string round my neck to get in from school. Parents both worked

@HeelsHandbagPerfumeCoffee*
I didn't know anyone with a bought house.
I was the youngest of 6 I got ALL my older siblings clothes.

@THEDEACON

Well I grew up working class but little of this was normal for us maybe we were posh !

You weren't posh. Just a normal WC family.

I don't know if this is working class, but did anyone used to play elastic at school. Where you basically had a big elastic rope/band with two people at either end and one in the middle jumping and making shapes with it? We also used to maypole dance 😂

Holes in all of your underwear and most of your clothes.

Clothes always being from a jumble sale and always 5 years out of fashion and smelling of mothballs.

Outside toilet

Frost on the windows

Knowing which family to avoid in the local area

I grew up in Surrey in the 1980s

Yes elastics

I was rubbish at it

We called the elastic round legs French Skipping. If you have tears prepare to shed them now, I was so unpopular I used to play it by myself in the house by wrapping the elastic bands around the legs of heavy armchairs. I was 14 0r 15.

We also did Maypole dancing in primary school on May Day, don't know what happened to the pole every other day of the year. We also had Country Dancing lessons in secondary school and sang folk songs like Mollie Malone in music lessons.

I was good at elastics plus my mum cleaned the post office so we had 100's of elastic bands.

sharing a room with 2 siblings
making a den in the woods from the fly-tipped rubbish , my dad used to visit for parts to fix/make stuff original eco womble
buying single cigarettes from the ice-cream van
hand me down clothes , jeans with many hem lines.

Drinking tea from the pot with every single meal.

@UntamedWisteria

I bet none of you on this thread is younger than 50!

I am! Most of this sounds late 70s/80s

Agree with stray dog

One year my DM and DF splurged on a Christmas tree that was much nicer than we usually had....apparently it wasn't as posh as I thought....A mate came round to mine to play and when he saw our tree he said "Huh? Why is your Christmas tree so small?" Tbf, he lived in a mansion that had ceilings at least 10 metres high
My mum just laughed ...our tree was at least 2 metres tall!🌲

@inappropriateraspberry
I remember that bedding from the 70s! I bet my mum still has it stuffed in the back of the bedding closet! It was very soft.

Others on this have reminded me of these:

The permanent lard in the chip pan!
Mopping up gravy with bread. And yes, I still do this... Husband grew up a bit "posher" than me and he definitely doesn't!
Dinner and tea. Not lunch and dinner. This can be a regional thiNg too, though.
50ps needed for the meter.
Cups of tea with meals.
Lots of empty houses. And playing in them. I remember roller skating in a nearly empty house at age 6...
Tip Top and tinned fruit... yum! And packet cheesecake and packet trifle and occasionally Vienetta!-were our posh puddings.
Blancmange.
Council estate kid here. Under 50.

Not a nearly empty house.
It was an empty house.
Good grief!

Also under 50!

@Ddot also remember vol au vents! My nana used to love them for a buffet if there was a special family event - she pronounced them volleyvons and buffy like the vampire slayer. God I miss her!

I used to get them ready made from jus rol in the 80s for her and pop in some mushrooms fried down and mixed with a little cream. She thought they were very posh! I think they were generally posh in the 80s (probably would be considered an mc kid but working class family background and nana lived in a council house)

Knew I'd spelt wrong but haha you got my meaning

Oh tinned shrimp, on rare posh days. I loved them and shared with timmy my ginger tom cat.

@Ddot I was really happy to see you mention them!! I used to think we were so sophisticated eating those.