The 80's: A Short Story

Every man and woman strives to achieve success, it’s what our parents teaches us from birth. However, a lot of people don’t realize success comes with a lot of failures. I’m not going to lie, I thought life would be easy. I graduate from high school, never got in trouble, and was a promising basketball star. In my adolescence years, things were handed to me, and I never really thought about my future. When the time came for me to take on the real world, I didn’t know what the struggle and the grind of life was. What made it even more tough was, growing up in the urban part of the bay area, which created chains of events that would change my life forever. My life was changing and I didn’t have a direction, and I kept sinking lower, until I
The drug, crack-cocaine was introduced to the streets. Now this drug wasn’t just any type drug, it brought destruction to families, millions of people were hook, and people were leaving their kids to pursue their habit. Unfortunately for me, I was one of those kids who lost a parent to the 80’s. Oakland in the 70’s was a soulful city, it symbolizes strength, and unity because of the Black Panthers. Consequently, when the 80’s hit, the city became all about survival, and there was only a few options, drug dealer, drug addict, jail, or death. With all that going around me, my family was very big on church, especially because my grandmother was a pastor. My grandmother was well-known in the community, because she took homeless people off the streets, feed them and give them shelter. She would have AA meeting, and took care of foster kids. I thought she was awesome for being such an important part of the city rebuild. At eight, my grandmother would send me and my cousins out to sell candy to help fund all her ideas. By the way, there was fifteen cousins, so my grandmother would make over a thousand dollars a day She would only give us a dollar for all that hard work. Where was the child labor laws? My grandmother said,” were doing this for the community,” and I was ok with that. As the 2000’s approach, my grandmother was slowing down, so my mother and aunties picked it up a
My grandmother taught me the most important lesson, always dream big, and never be afraid to fail. I was never a bad kid, I never did drugs, even though I was selling them, I was scared I would get hook on it like my dad. I’ve had very good guide throughout life, but I chose my own path. I thought I was a bad person, but I realize that life is about mistakes, and with our society being so judgmental, we need more leaders to step up more than ever. My son is now 12 years old, I try my best as his dad to push him to love people, and always be a part of community. At this point in my life, I want keep my family mindset to help as many people as we can. I have been though a million struggles, but I know it’s a million more to go. I tell the young men and women, my job is to give them the tools, but it takes them to use it. One day, hopefully when it’s all said and done, I can say I chosen the right path, and I made a change in somebody’s