I have always been aware of experiencing privilege and experiencing it from both sides. I guess that makes me middle class – privileged enough to obviously have had many things some folks don’t, and not quite privileged enough to have many of the things a lot of other people have. That’s been my whole life, with periods of being on the lower end of the spectrum due to the respectable task of being a full-time student and periods of being on the slightly higher end of things due to an amazing full-time job at a university.
blonde-haired, blue-eyed Kelly getting off a piano stool, wearing a blue long-sleeved shirt and dinosaur-print pants
With my little legs just barely sticking out over the seat in my mom’s gold Hornet, I remember the knee of my corduroys being patched. It was the 70’s and this was a thing, though the picture is long gone. For my family, thrift went Depression-era deep and the handling of money was tight. Money was not wasted. It was worked hard for and spent when needed, but literally *only* when needed – no take-out pizzas, no trips to the movie theater, no vacations to the ocean or even to another state – none of that. That was for rich folks, or those who spent unwisely. Part of the thrifty, disciplined monetary experience of my early years would later influence my environmental perspective on consumerism and what people really do need to survive, and part of it would influence my environmental perspective, as thrift has a lighter environmental footprint than consumerism. And part of this experience would later influence my own ability to live frugally and to manage money. That, in fact, is part of my lineage going back to the Poet Laureate for the Queen of England, Robert Herrick. I’m proud of my lineage, and I see it coming through in more ways than one. I was a little blonde-haired girl growing up on a Christmas tree farm in rural Maine, with my hands in the dirt and my heart in visions, dreams, and experience - total sensation and emotional sensitivity that is close to my Pisces water in water nature.
As my little legs began to walk around, they took me places and my eyes started to notice things. Namely, not all the little kids in town wore patched-up corduroys. Some of the kids had new clothes and had new toys, always wearing the latest trendy fashion or getting the newest popular toy. The one place that my legs took me the most often was school, an unfortunate experience for someone who loved learning so greatly. School was a social stewing pot, where all the children went to see who had more than the others and who had less. It made me feel less than. Those who had more were popularized and those who had less were made fun of. I was always in the middle. In retrospect this was a good place to be - it allowed me a better vantage point, able to see both sides. I wasn’t so far removed that I was looking down on everyone from the perspective of having more than enough, and I wasn’t looking all the way up the food chain because I didn’t have enough.
I was lucky that my grandparents, wise money-managers, filled the gap financially for me and my mom. My mom received her college degree in 1996 only two years before I did, meaning that for most of my formative 0-17 years, she was working for minimum wage at mostly blue-collar, labor-based jobs. She worked at the local woolen mill most of my childhood; I remember her coming home one holiday saying that they were going to give her a free turkey at Thanksgiving and I was wide-eyed and grateful that they would *give* us something so valuable. I was so happy for that turkey. Tiny Tim vibes, anyone?
Kelly holding her Beagle Betsy's chin for photo op against the backdrop of a sunny summer day in Maine at the tree farm amidst a lawn full of yellow hawkweed
Photo of the Christmas tree field, with blueberry bushes fire-red and orange in the foreground. The autumn colors of deciduous trees create the backdrop against a bright blue sky behind well-groomed fir and pine trees growing for the holidays
My grandparents had a large 10+-acre Christmas tree farm with a large ornamental shrub nursery that was active during the spring and summer; the Christmas tree part of the farm boomed from November 1st to December 25th. I loved that time of year and to this day anticipate the holidays remembering the traditional Maine holiday season. Big rig trucks would pull up the long paved driveway in early-to-mid November, collecting hundreds of trees that my grandfather put through the tree baler of his own patent and design. My uncle helped him. The men worked hard sawing down trees with chainsaws, wearing plaid flannel not because it was trendy, but because it was warm and probably sold locally. Flecks of tree trunk shavings colored the snow and tree boughs laid in festive piles. Meanwhile my grandmother could be found in a well-lit basement, the wreath
maker rhythmically humming as she put together Balsam fir boughs collected by my grandfather, uncle, and me. The aromas of sawdust and fir boughs filled me to my soul. Deeper even. They penetrated and nourished me through some of my hardest moments of human experience growing up in rural Maine. Thankfully, I always had enough and it’s my belief to this day that that is all I can truly ask for. I saw both sides growing up - I looked from my vantage point to those in my town who really did not have enough and saw that it bred social discord and sometimes violence; i saw those who had more than enough, and saw how it allowed them more ease of social, educational, and political opportunity. I took note, and paid attention to academics in school; that was my way out. I had less interest in the social side, because that side was cattiness and meanness while academics were going to help get me out of this town. And they did.
my cousins' family, selecting their Christmas tree in 1981
It wasn’t until adulthood that I learned the word “socioeconomic” and the implications thereof. I was in a sociology class in undergraduate school creatively called Sociology 101. I had barely heard the word before. I had never been exposed to this field of human study in my cookie-cutter, small-town public (and private) school education. And it was the first “C” that I ever received in my entire educational career, pre-K to my first year of college. And it was one of the last. To explain my public and private school experiences - I attended private religious school from partway through 4th grade through the end of my 9th grade year, spanning two different schools. I was sent there because I was a holy handful for my single mom and for my grandparents. Although neither instigating party was religious, they saw the value in it for disciplining the youth (me) as part of a good upbringing. Bless my Gram, she really felt so strongly about raising me right. I have so much to thank her for. And I do thank her inside myself every day. So once again, I had the opportunity to see both sides of the tracks – I experienced a public school education yet I was privileged enough to attend a spendy private school, despite being from a family that qualified me for free and reduced lunch. I began to see clearly where public education had been sub-par. I quickly excelled in this new environment, though the day I arrived they had to drag me in, literally kicking and screaming, and forced me to wear a skirt. Ugh. Sigh. My tom-boyish nature truly hated wearing dresses or skirts of any kind, but it became part of my life for the next 5 years. I pushed the line by wearing them way too short, showing off my awesome legs and pushing back against the authority that made me wear the skirt in the first place. I may have gotten into trouble for this at least a couple of times.
photo from my 4th - 6th grade class at private school, 1985; hoping they all don't mind me sharing
In high school it was the same. I moved back to public high school in 10th grade, after the group of popular kids - my larger friend group from childhood - had the chance to weather the storms of middle school and adolescence and form tighter bonds. I was an insider-outsider at that point, which truly suited my nature; it stayed that way for me for the rest of high school. I was included, but never really felt 100% included. I played all the sports and did all the clubs, but never felt like I truly revealed myself lest I be deemed unacceptable. I honestly never quite felt good enough from a material perspective, and now that I’m older I realize that sense of self-worth went much deeper ~ as part of my lineage; I feel it came from my Gram Herrick’s side. The same haves and have-nots were there when I returned to public school; some of the players had changed and new ones had moved to town, but the same small-town socioeconomic divide was there. Most of the popular kids had stuff, and most of the unpopular ones didn’t. Occasionally there would be this break-through person whose personality escalated them to the popular group, even though they came from a low-income or impoverished family. But that was rare. I realize in retrospect that many of the kids I perceived as “haves” and many of my friends were from harder backgrounds than I realized. Rural Maine was a stern life lesson. The schools and teachers did a lot to love and nurture us all and I’m grateful for them. Especially grateful for my Kindergarten teacher Ms. Emhoff, who lovingly taught us how to read, showed us the life cycle of monarch butterflies, and thought mostly well of me even though I got in trouble for “stealing” trees from a property adjoining the school. That is another story! But the hardships of rural life were real. And they stuck with me, informed me, and made me into what I think is a stronger person.
Monarch butterfly on pink and white milkweed flowers
By the time I got to college, I was so used to being middle-class (or lower-middle-class) that I didn’t expect that ever to change. I accepted my status, and didn’t expect even a college education to change that too much. I was just glad to have gotten out and now spinning my wheels treading water to make sure I stayed. My mindframe and worldview had been middle class for so long, I didn’t know anything else was possible. I just worked hard to get the best grades I could, knowing that if there was one way out and up for me, it was education. Education had gotten me out of my small little town, landing me in a college town on the coast of northern Massachusetts. There were running trails throughout the woods, and the ocean was a thirty- minute walk away. Despite having lived the stark contrast of socioeconomic divides my entire life, I wasn’t prepared for the stark contrast between haves and have-nots that I experienced in college. Once again, I was thoughtfully struck about just how close to the poverty end of the spectrum I truly was growing up in comparison to my peers who came from much more obviously well-to-do families, with love and support of both parents, who had nice rugs and nice clothes, fancy suitcases, and cute adornments for their college rooms. I still had more than some, but the immigrant/refugee/study-abroad population became my new best friends. I felt
more at home with them in my level of material wealth and opportunity as compared to some of the richer (mostly white) students. I felt more at home with them in my heart. They stimulated my curiosity about other cultures and the world in ways I had never known. I would truly never be the same. The close bonds I formed with these friends during that difficult time-period of living away from home for the first time, finding my footing as a young adult relatively on my own, would change me forever and impact my worldview and decision-making for the rest of my life. The friendships I formed with peers who were more well-to-do in the categories of money and family support were life-changing and informative as well. They were a path towards self-acceptance and self-love that I had never known possible. For example, my mom didn’t come to visit me during college, even though I was only a four-hour drive away. I went to college on an airplane with a couple of suitcases with a green comforter blanket and a purple shower caddy I had earned that summer by working at a local Dairy bar. I cried my eyes out the whole flight. Bless my poor mom, she and I have never gotten along well. The distance has persisted to this day. I was a strong-willed child who challenged authority often and well. I don’t blame her in some ways for letting me go on my own, but as a parenting choice, it wasn’t the most supportive. So I, like the immigrant, refugee, and study-abroad kids from other countries, stayed at school working during breaks; no parents came to visit us. I held catering and landscaping jobs, entering some of the most historic mansions in the northeast while working for minimum wage, which at that time was between $6-$7 dollars per hour, I think. (Maybe it was more, but I know it was that low at least for some part of my early earning years.) Those who stayed behind on the college breaks became each others’ families. And those who had more (support, money) went home to what I pictured as the perfect lives for the holidays, coming back loaded with new things and of course, the “happiness” those things bring.
Yet, I was privileged to have a strong body, despite some structural issues I would discover later, and ran on the college cross country team, swam on the club for two years, and played lacrosse. I was part of clubs, had a work-study job, and attended college balls at historic castles! I was always walking the line between privilege and lack thereof; these were intertwined with my existence in each moment of my life. (Sadly, many pictures from this time period still only exist as hard-copy versions. I don't have electronic copies with me to upload here.)
1994 Gordon College XC team photo
I’m not sure I ever will get over the envy I have felt my entire life for those who had more, but I think I’m almost there. I have definitely developed gratitude and appreciation for my experiences - all of them have been teachers. I have spent so long looking at things from both perspectives that I believe it has made me a better person - more able to understand the human experience and barriers that we all face as humans (depression, anxiety, mental health issues, lack of nurture, loss of family members, abuse, violence…). Although some of these are more prevalent for low socioeconomic households or those who have trauma history (see ACES - adverse childhood experiences for more on this), things like the pandemic have been quite an equalizer. There is no one who hasn’t experienced stress or some measure of discomfort. But it’s important for me to recognize that some have experienced far greater disparity, and most often those are low-income individuals of color – the ones who were my family during college and the ones who would become like my children through the Upward Bound program.
Kelly visiting Gram Herrick and Jason, the cocker spaniel, at her home on the tree farm in Guilford during one of my first school visit trips to Greenville as Grad Assistant for Upward Bound
After college and several short-term jobs, I landed in graduate school at the University of Maine, basically a ship without a sail or an anchor, searching for the direction that would become my adult life. I found it at the University of Maine Upward Bound Math-Science (UBMS) Program. When I began graduate school, I did so tentatively, taking just a couple of classes that could easily be prerequisites for several different programs and as is so characteristic of me, resistant to fully committing with my heart-mind-body. (Before this, I had applied to the Peace Corps and also thought for a moment I would move out to St. Louis to get to know my dad’s side of the family.) Luckily, the first graduate class that I took was called The Social Context of Education. John Maddaus was the teacher. And he was quirky and kind. He was using the class to do qualitative research on the University of Maine’s Upward Bound (UB) program. Upward Bound serves low-income high school students who want to become the first generation within their immediate families to attend and complete college. I had never heard of this program, though it served my former Piscataquis Community High School in Guilford, Maine. Even though I would have qualified, the counselors never suggested it to me because they saw me as an “A” student who didn’t need support. Wow, they really had no idea just how much support I could have used. Regardless, Dr. Maddaus took me under his wing, recognizing that I sought direction and that I had promise. When one of the Graduate Assistants for the Upward Bound Program dropped out of his role in March of the following year, John encouraged me to apply. And I did. From that date, I also decided to apply for grad school to study Science Education and I was chosen to receive the UB Assistantship, which paid for my grad school and gave me a liveable stipend. Coming from a poverty-deficit mind, I worked two jobs (shhh, don’t tell - grad students are only supposed to legally work 20 hours while in school; I worked 40 hours, and still got almost a 4.0)!
The Upward Bound Program opened my eyes and helped me put words to my socioeconomic experiences growing up. I had previously always been ashamed of those indicators. I tried to cover them up. I wanted to hide them so that I appeared perfect on the outside, so that I would be accepted and acceptable by all facets of professional and well-educated society. Growing up, I internalized the idea from my family relationships that professionalism was more important than warmth of heart or nurture. (I now know my grandma’s warmth came through in her cooking and care and love of guiding me - I see that more now than ever before. And I have endeavored to balance the scale too, leaning into softening and opening my heart, rewiring my nervous system, and relearning ingrained patterns over the years.) I learned to see the world differently through my experiences at Upward Bound. I learned that it’s true - not everyone has a shoelace to pull themselves up. An understanding which began in undergraduate school was now even more clearly realized - I had been raised in a prejudiced household . I was taught that with hard work everyone could find success, that help wasn’t taken from outside the family even if it was needed, and cringe-worthy ideas that viewed non-white people as lazy or burdens to society. Yet I was also taught by my grandmother to always be kind to everyone, a point of dissonance. I took her advice, and the world opened up to me. Through the Upward Bound program I began to embrace my dissonant past, embrace my lower middle class upbringing and my own self-worth, and endeavored to help other students from small Maine towns and impoverished inner cities throughout New England to receive guidance and support needed to reach for their educational goals and social dreams. I was a fit because I could relate. Once again, I had been on their side of the tracks, and largely through a college education now found myself on the other side. I found enough economic security to eventually purchase a home in Orono, considered one of the more wealthy, elite towns in Maine. I had arrived and felt that my soul glowed satisfaction at my level of comfort yet also in my ability to give back to help others achieve the same.
Photo of Upward Bound group visiting Husson College
Fast-forward to many years later, as I continued working for Upward Bound and moved up through the ranks. I was privileged to have the opportunity to get college classes paid for as a UMaine employee, but also had enough grit and determination to actually do it. And through that, I earned my second Master’s degree. It should have been a PhD, but I guess I’m saving that for last. Through a combination of hard work and opportunity, I have been able to build my adult life. Upward Bound afforded me with the self-knowledge and acceptance of myself, and gave me a strong foundation of support as I went through the somewhat ugly stages of young adult growth and development, unlearning biased worldviews I had grown up with and relearning the world through a socioeconomically educated lens. The fit was perfect, and I flourished. I was given the opportunity for professional development and advancement, to travel, and eventually the chance to buy the aforementioned house, all because I committed my life to the program.
I was given the opportunity to collaborate with professors and graduate students from all
disciplines, particularly STEM, and to hear inspirational stories of the personal struggles and successes each of them had on their personal and academic journeys. I was able to finally put privilege in perspective, and to understand the huge impacts that socioeconomic conditions can have, not only on education but also on health and ultimately life itself.
During the 17 years I spent with the program my first time around (I say that because maybe I will go back someday), I began to gravitate towards yoga, a practice I had begun as a 10-year old child by looking at pictures in the book Yoga, Youth, and Reincarnation by Jess Stearn. My mom had purchased the book for 10 cents at a local yard sale, but never read it. I devoured whatever I could of it. Later, I added the practices of meditation and even later still, acupuncture. I realize now that these are all practices that help regulate the nervous system, and that people from low-socioeconomic backgrounds may have greater need for such regulation. These practices did so much for my personal growth and development as well as for my health, that I wanted to help others experience the same. Plus, being the ever-curious Pisces, the lifelong learner and dreamer, I had to of course leave my well-adjusted life to go study this medicine.
As a friend described it, I moved West to study the East. And with that move, I once again experienced the pivot from wealth to poverty, from advantage to disadvantage, of disadvantage flavored with advantage, and advantage flavored with disadvantage. I was privileged to have saved enough money, to have the grit needed to get to Oregon, to have the study skills to persevere through the hardest academic program I’ve ever completed. I finally had nice clothes thanks to my time at Upward Bound, and could fit in more seamlessly with my classmates from more socioeconomically privileged backgrounds. Even though, let’s face it - learning acupuncture and the ability to attend expensive professional school is a privilege in and of itself, though students all come from a range of backgrounds, there is an elitist flavor to it. And yet at the same time that I experienced the luxury of being in an elitist educational program in a beautiful building constructed upon ceremony and feng shui, I was in a full-time academic program earning barely any money, and found myself on state food and medical assistance for the first time in my life - ever. It was a mental hurdle to overcome and there was some personal shame I spent time overcoming that was involved with this new self-chosen position in life. I organized my life around studying, saving money, spending literally *only* what was needed, doing food delivery when I could, and going to the food bank on Sundays. I was starkly conscious of being in line at the food bank, wearing nicer clothes than the others in line, having taken a shower, and come from a warm bed in a room with heat, carrying my expensive mac laptop, ready to explain to anyone in an instant that I truly was in need, and these things were just leftovers from the life I just left - the life that I would spend years trying to rebuild, to once again attain that basic level of being okay, being comfortable, and just having enough.
And now I have 3 Master’s degrees, which definitely oozes privilege. It has been the combination of hard work, support, and opportunity, definitely – of chances taken and obstacles overcome. I now have a sweet little studio (not my own; I sublet a room from a more seasoned practitioner). I own things like a crystal sound bowl, beautiful large plants, fancy infrared heated mats, and an assortment of healing gemstones, tuning forks, acupuncture needles, cups, and a hammered copper gua sha tool handmade by my professor. I have a partner who has had a similarly interesting yet glaringly different experience of abundance and lack thereof. The flip side of having the material things and the satisfaction of learning Chinese medicine is that I now have a mountain of debt, and I will be slave to it for years to come. Please, come on, Biden. Forgive the loans now. The repayment to society will be great, as I will be able to pay it forward to my clients and patients for greater access to alternative, now-becoming-mainstream, healthcare.
So as you now know, I've lived my life on the pivot-point of wealth and poverty - mostly in the middle, but experiencing a little taste of both sides. Wherever I travel, I’ve always been attracted to that contrast and been interested in discussing those ideas. It is one of the topics that lights me up like no other. I don’t wish the experience of true poverty on anyone, and I aspire to have enough to be comfortable, and meet my material obligations, to enjoy myself more than I was allowed in childhood, and maybe enough so that I can make some wise investments that will ensure I’m taken care of when I’m older. There is certainly more to this story. It is written in my bones, my DNA, my skin, my eyes, my love, and my emotions, my attachments. It is written in the ever-unfolding life that is mine.
Thanks to Quest Center for asking me the question recently of how I have experienced privilege and for reminding me of my answer. Though it may take a while for me to be as fluent with public speaking as I was when I left Upward Bound in 2017, I can definitely write and formulate my words so that the next time I’m asked this question, the answer flows much more fluidly from my heart to my brain to my tongue.
Image of Kelly at Multnomah + Bridal Veil Falls, Columbia River Gorge, Oregon; Dec 2019
Abundant flow of all good things to you, no matter where you now find yourself and what experiences you’ve had to make you, you.
Namaste.
Written by kelly a. Ilseman, LAc, MAcOM, MS, MEd. March 5, 2022
with thanks to my grandfather, the Wise Old Owl
for encouraging me to write,
and reminding me that words are gold
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