[bethling]

Until I met my wife, I hadn't realized exactly the fortune I had with my family. My parents were teachers and really understood the value of education. We came from a modest background, but it was stable and they did push me to focus on school. I went to a really good school (yay need based financial aid), have a great job that pays me well.

On the other hand, we have my wife. She is smarter than me, but went 7 different schools as her family moved from place to place before she finally dropped out, worked retail as she essentially raised one of her sisters as she scraped by. In a more stable environment, she'd have almost certainly ended up in law or business school.

She now really tries to provide some sort of stability, and encourage focusing on schoolwork with her nieces and nephews, who are in danger of repeating the history of poverty.

Seeing that makes me realize how very lucky I was to be born into the family I was, and everything I took for granted really isn't just what "normal" is.