Off The Scale?

I was taught to share what I had as I grew up,
though compared with others
what I had was truly unimpressive.

Indeed, I surely encouraged snobbery
through admitting how little I had.
And snobbery hides in competition
the way jealousy hides in ownership.

But for good and ill I made what I had seem right,
in spite of how the systems that created one winner
always created many more losers who had to hide
their conspicuous lack of success,
and had little to hide behind.

Being thoroughly repetitive,
and poor of speech and money,
my parents never rhapsodised
about their choices or mine,
or the 'what might have been's'
were we materially better off.

Mentoring was off their scale,
and altogether beyond their comprehension.
In the world they lived in giving of your means
was relatively easy, but nobody talked
about how time was shared or given.