Well, Kathy, I would also be the first one to gripe about the word "worth," when used as "The tycoon is worth an estimated X million dollars." No. He *HAS* X million dollars. He is *WORTH* the same as any other human being, no more and no less.

I'm sorry your son is looking down on you. It is wrong for him to think himself "better" than someone else, because he is more financially well-off.

I am not rich. My husband and I live in a single-wide mobile home, and our car is a five-year-old Ford Taurus we bought used from our pastor. But do you know, there are some in my family who will accuse me of the same materialism your son is displaying, because their cars are beat-up thirty-year-old clunkers. My husband has had the same career for over 25 years, while most of my family hops from one minimum wage job to the next. So they *think* of him as rich, especially when he can provide something for me (like adequate medical care) that my parents never did. And when my husband and I honeymooned in Hawaii--I actually felt guilty about it, because nobody else in my family had ever been there.

One more thing--somehow my parents always had enough to buy their beer and cigarettes, but school clothes were a luxury they couldn't afford. My clothes were hand-me-downs from a great-aunt. Imagine wearing old-lady clothes to school when you're 12! I was a very unpopular kid. Similarly, we were only allowed to bathe once a week because my parents wanted to save money on soap, shampoo, and other grooming necessities. My father once criticized my brother for not being satisfied with this. "He doesn't like anything unless it's brand new, the latest style, and costs a bundle." No, he just didn't want to go to school looking like a dork, and have the other kids making fun of him, that's all. My father had grown up in dirt poverty and felt as a matter of principle that we should not have anything he himself didn't have growing up.

The mentality I am criticizing is that of, "If I can't have it, then neither should you." I don't see you criticizing your son for being financially better off--only for looking down on you, because you're not.