TL;dr - Grew up with too much, thought it was nice not to be normal. Know better now.
Well, I didn't grow up in a bubble, and I read a lot, so I was always somewhat aware that my life was different from most. I knew my family name and my friends' family names commanded respect, and I understood that certain privileges and responsibilities came with it. I knew even as a child that it wasn't standard for adults and children not to integrate, not even on family holidays. We were four families, all close from the parents' parent's having known each other etc, and every year we'd go away together, and the adults would go off and do their thing, and the kids and some paid guardian would go off and do something else, and even at meal times we never sat at the same table. I had friends come along with us a few times and they thought this was super-weird.
Even so, my parents (mom and stepdad, to be precise) were pretty cool and laid back most of the time. Mom could be a bit of a snob at times, but mostly regarding anything she thought might be "in bad form". Example - when she caught me smoking in my late teens she was more concerned with how it looked than how it might've affected my health. But for the most part she was, if mostly absent, at least tried to use her money and influence to help others, spearheading charities and actually getting involved rather than just throwing money at problems. I don't know if she did it out of a sense of obligation or she genuinely believed it was the right thing to do - we didn't talk much - but it got done, and that was the important part, I think, and I respected that.
But I also, for a time, had a number of very questionable friends, similar to certain types found in 80s high school films, who made it a point to brag about how much "better" we were and to go out of their way to make those they considered inferior know about it, while doing nothing to correct the imbalance. (I'm not proud, and I admit I was an asshole at times as well. For instance, once when I was about 13 I'd spent the morning in the infirmary and was heading back to class when this horrible girl who always picked on me stopped me and asked - for everyone to hear - "What's wrong with you? You're always sick. You got some disease or something?" I was grumpy and headachy and replied something like, "We don't all come from hardy peasant stock like you." A teacher overheard and I got sent to the principal and told I couldn't talk to people like that. My stepdad thought it was hilarious, though. Mom, not so much.)
I remember sometime in the late 80s hearing this letter read on the Long Distance Dedication section of American Top 40. It was about this very young couple. Girl had gotten pregnant, parents kicked both kids out and they lived in some shitty apartment where the heat had just been turned off. The guy was dedicating the song to his girlfriend because he knew they had nothing else but each other and he wanted her to know how much he loved her. I thought it was the sweetest, most romantic thing. I wanted that! I thought, that was the answer - take away all material comforts, and you only have each other, and you love each other so much more. I started seriously fantasizing about being dirt poor, being able to afford nothing but love for one another. (In my fantasy we lived in a shack at the foot of the Colorado mountains, one with nature, the air, the birds, the streams... It was always summer, naturally.) Yes, I was naive.
Anyway, I mostly notice the discrepancy now when I hear people talk about student loans and mortgages and saving for retirement and whatnot. I feel sort of left out sometimes, because it doesn't really register on a level I can understand it. I bounced from one college to another, across continents, finally doubled-majored in mostly useless areas, and the funniest part is, I'd sort of quit after getting a C in COBOL lowered my 4.0 GPA and I was just lazing around the house when my mom said I could either "go back to school or get a job". I literally saw it as a life choice, and I thought myself rather clever for doing so. I went back to school. I graduated in 1995. I've done fuck all since then. I got bored a couple times and tried to work, but I have no discipline, no useful skills, and a fuckload of emotional dysregulation issues that complicate matters. A lot of people think I'm lucky, never having to work, but I'm secretly envious of people with genuine careers. I wasted too much time and it's way too late to get in the game.
I didn't think it was 'normal' to live the way I do, but I certainly thought it was better. Took a while to recognize the emptiness for what it is....
Note: I'm not complaining, just giving a fair assessment of the existing situation and the realizations that sometimes come too late.