Ian Longo
Tamara Cooke Henry
2/11.14
Outside Assignment 3
My First Glimpse of
Reality
I grew up
in Readington New Jersey, a predominately white rural/suburban area in
Hunterdon County, which is one of the wealthiest counties in the nation. I grew
up in a small one-story ranch with my parents and older sister. Together both
of my parents were able to put together a very good annual salary. My family
always supported me in school and other activities such as sports. Although I
do not consider myself a religious person, I did very consistently attend
church and created very strong close connections with people in the
congregation. I attended Hunterdon Central Regional High School a very large, and
highly respected high school, a blue ribbon school of excellence.
As a child I spent much time with
my father’s family, but not as much with my mother’s. I never thought too much
of it. But slowly as I grew older and matured more I was able to notice that
this wasn’t just by chance. I began to see that my parents were purposely not
exposing me to my mother’s family. But from the few times a year that I did see
my aunts, uncles and grandparents form my mother’s side of the family I was
able to see a stark difference in my two parents’ families. Everyone on my
father’s side was very intelligent, successful, and happy. My mother’s family
however consists of people with character issues and financial problems.
So it would be a bit of an
understatement to say that I had not felt any serious struggles growing up, or
truly seen anyone struggle first hand. That is up until just before the start
of my senior year in high school. After years of not caring for their house,
and serious hording, my mother and her siblings decided that it was time to
help my grandparents. They all want to their house to start cleaning it out,
regardless of what they said. After examining the house, they found disgusting
amounts of mold, and a gas leak. It was clear it was unsafe to live in that
house. So because we were the only ones who could support them, my
grandparents, and aunt who never moved out of her parent’s home came to stay
with us.
Luckily my sister had been moved
out for a couple years at this point so there was an empty bedroom. However it
was only large enough to sleep two of them (my grandparents). So my aunt Mary
stayed in our newly redone basement, a project my father had been saving up for
for years and now lost it to his sister-in-law.
So now the house that was built to
fit a family of four was now housing six. With still another month until school
started, I had plenty of time at home to spend with my retired grandparents and
unemployed aunt. And for the first time, I saw people who have struggled. And I
understood why they struggled. The biggest thing that was easy for me to see
was that none of the three of them were well educated. In fact, I would go as
far to describe them as completely ignorant. The racist comments, blatant lies,
and crude comments toward my grandmother from my grandfather made him someone I
despised to be around. The lack of drive from my aunt to find a job and place
of her own made me angry because it was clear that she was just using my
parents. The idea of having a life of her own was something that clearly scared
her, and she would not listen to my mom anytime she tried to help her or talk
to her. Seeing my grandmother stand-by and allow them to live the way they do
made me just sad. I could see that she was a good person, but made poor decisions
in her life that led her here.
I had never been happier for school
to start; finally I was able to be out of the house away from these people all
day. As the school year went on I started to stay in my bedroom more and more.
There was not much to do in there, but it was better than spending time out
with my aunt and grandparents. As I started applying to colleges I started
thinking too. I realized exactly how important education was. I had examples of
success (my mother and father) and hard lives (my aunt and grandparents) all
living in the same house as me. And what became clear to me the difference was
higher education. Both my parents had attended college, I don’t think my
grandparents or aunt ever finished high school. It was here that I realized just
how lucky I am that I was put in this great position to succeed so I better not
squander it.
My Grandparents finally moved out
just before Christmas. My aunt stayed until the following June, the same time I
got my first job. I got a job in a local grocery store. It was here that I got
my first look at a real work place. Quickly my part-time job started to feel
like a real job. Within a couple weeks the store lost many employees, and
started giving me more and more hours. Soon enough I was working six days a
week, and I was no stranger to eight-and-a-half-hour shifts. Although the money
I was making was pretty good for an 18 year old just out of high school, I soon
realized that this is not at all the kind of job I want to do for the rest of
my life. This only reinforced the idea I had about the importance of higher
education. As I now go through my college career this is something that I try
to keep in mind in order to keep myself focused and on the strait and narrow.
