Too fat for Selfridges

By Sarah Gee on Oct 27, 08 07:31 PM in Lifestyle

The BBC TV programme to be aired this evening on the UK's class system, hosted by John and Pauline Prescott, looks to answer a question that's been plaguing me for a while now: is it possible to have working-class values while living a middle-class lifestyle?

John Prescott claims to be able to spot who attended public school by 'their confidence, the way they speak, and the way they dress'. Not sure what he'd make of me, but I suspect on first meeting that he'd pigeon-hole me as grammar school material. In fact, I had very much a Comprehensive education, albeit within a specialist music school, and I'm very proud of the fact that my granddad at various times in his life was a miner, worked in a Singer sewing machine factory, and ended up as a foreman in a Clyde shipyard. My grannie's best friends were the offspring of Red Clydesider - hardly middle-class credentials.

However, in looking at a new report from the Arts Council of England on segmentation of audiences I realised with a sinking feeling that the old man and me had become clichÃÂ©s. Fitting squarely into the segment titled 'Urban arts eclectic', it seems we've been sussed with everything on our horribly predictable existence mapped out in front of me: our Ocado shopping habit, our love of travel which is tinged with environmental concerns (but only to the extent of carbon off-setting, which I know deep down is really a sticking plaster), our fondness for Radio 4 comedy, the planned lack of children in our home, etc. The report ended with the lines "They typically talk to people about clothes, food, healthy living, alcoholic drinks and mobile phones. " O lordy, please shoot me if I ever start talking to you about mobile phones....but the rest is probably true.

It was my husband who wailed the title of this blog, as we looked for new jeans a few weeks ago; he suddenly realised that the fashion brands were no longer after his hard-earned pounds and he was officially now 'too fat for Selfridges'. We've become middle-aged, middle-class, people in middle England and we don't think we belong here.

So over the next few months I'm going to try very hard to do some things which take me out of my comfort zone. Instead of doing things like seeing Jeremy Hardy in stand up (very very funny, seeing as you ask, but we were the youngest people in the audience - I know because he did a whole section on the average age of his fan base and asked anyone under 40 to put their hands up), it's now time for something completely different.

So, on Friday 14th November I'll be sleeping rough to raise money for St. Basils (please sponsor me!) and before that checking out the upcoming musical talent at Gigeth.

All other suggestions for things I could do to stave off middle-aged boredom would be very welcome.