Spring Break in the Hamptons

"What did you do over spring break?"
"I went to a friend's house in the Hamptons. What about you?"
"That Hamptons?! That's so Gossip Girl of you! I'm at home. Your life is so exciting!"

This phone call happened a year ago, and it was the first of many breaks I would experience with my friends from home. Even though my family did not own any summer homes, two of my freshman year roommates owned houses in Cape Cod, and another guy living on my floor owned a house in the Hamptons, which he later invited me and six others to vacation at for Spring Break. Since I have arrived on campus, I have been made used to the idea of summer homes. I no longer balk at the idea of someone I know living in a house on 5th Ave in New York, but I also recognize such things as symbols of the upper class. 

For example, you can see the backyard through the windows. It's not very clear, but in the upper left hand corner is the edge of the tennis court. We all decided to take a picture in my friend's sitting room, which was decorated with a lot of blue and yellow, with blue China everywhere.

At the same time, some parts of the fabulously wealthy lifestyle still make me uncomfortable, because they go against my middle class upbringing. For example, my friend's family employed a housekeeper. I was not used to having somebody, other than my mother, picking up after me. My friend's mom also had the cooks come to the house each night to cook us dinner. It wasn't strange at all for my friend, who had grown up with cooks and housekeepers, but it was strange for me, because I was being served food but I also didn't have a customer-server relationship with the cooks.

We took a picture with most of the group. The housekeeper is in the middle; she's the black blur wearing all white.

Because I now have such different life experiences than my friends from home, I can't consider myself part of their status group. At the same time, I'm not like my new Harvard friends, because my family does not have a summer home I can vacation at whenever I want. I suppose I am still in limbo now.