'Everything about this moment is much too posh' (The Guardian)

'Everything about this moment is much too posh'
Jon RonsonSaturday February 10, 2007The Guardian

It is Friday night. Our new neighbour, Sam, has invited us for dinner. The whole thing is worrying me - relations between us have been frosty since he discovered I've been writing about him in the Guardian. (He saw through the pseudonym.) And now we've had a startling dinner invitation.
"Oh my God," I whisper to my wife, Elaine, as we arrive at their front door. "They live in a huge house. They're incredibly rich. And Sam and I obviously don't like each other. Why is there this... this... perseverance?"

"Just be nice," says Elaine.
A woman opens the door. "Hi!" she says. "I'm Olivia!"
"Hi!" we say.
"Oh, I love your coat!" Elaine says, examining their coat-stand. "It's beautiful."
"Well, it's perfect for the school run on a winter's morning!" says Olivia. She and Elaine sigh contentedly. I scowl inwardly. "This is too posh," I think.
"Did you go anywhere nice for Christmas?" I ask.
"The Bahamas," says Olivia. "The children played barefoot in the sand. They looked so cute in their Petit Bateau costumes."
"It's ALL SO POSH," I think, alarmed. "When did my life get so posh?"

I glance at Elaine. "This is her fault," I think. "She's the person who has brought poshness into our lives." I narrow my eyes. "She has a tendency to enjoy posh things, but now it's gone too far. Surely even Elaine can see that this is unacceptably posh. In fact, this is turning out to be a kind of benchmark of poshness, like that terrible thing that happened six years ago in Cornwall."
We were staying at an expensive boutique hotel in Cornwall. "This is too posh," I thought as I lay on a deckchair. Elaine was off with our then two-year-old son, Joel. "What am I?" I thought. "Some kind of swan? No! I'm a worker! I work."
Suddenly I heard a scream.

I looked up and saw Elaine tearing past me, ashen-faced. "What?" I shouted.
"Joel'sspilledbloodyMaryonawoman'spashmina!" she yelled as she screeched towards the toilets. "Ineedawetcloth!"
I furrowed my brow. "Everything about this moment," I thought, "is much too posh."
And now, six years later, we are in another too-posh situation. "I'm glad Joel spilled bloody Mary on that woman's pashmina back then," I think. "What is a pashmina, anyway? The truffle of scarves? What the hell is that all about?"
"Does Joel have a school uniform?" Olivia asks us. "Ours do, and they look like they're in Malory Towers!" Olivia sees her family, I realise, in terms of how they must look to others. They play barefoot in the sand. They do the school run in appropriate coats.
"Is this the posh person's tragedy?" I think ruefully. "To be able to see yourself only from the perspective of how other people see you?"
"I've got three weeks off work," says Sam over dinner.
"You should use the time to learn a new skill," I suggest.
"Like what?" Sam asks.
"Golf!" I say. "Learn golf!"
"Would you take up golf?" says Sam, glancing at me suspiciously.
"No," I say.
"Then why did you say that?" he loudly snaps. There's a silence. Everyone looks at me.
"It was the first thing that came into my mind," I say. "Jesus!" I think. "Leave me alone, you posh people."
Later that night I go to my poor friend Stephen's flat for a drink. "You don't know how lucky you are to be poor," I say, emotionally. "It's so much cosier and more comfortable. And your neighbours may be drunks, but they're real."
"Oh piss off," says Stephen.