You will never be anything

by Celeste Atkina

Parents generally teach their children that if they try hard enough, they can fulfill all their goals and dreams. Many famous persons have done great things with their lives despite growing up in a life of poverty. Really, there is nothing wrong with parents telling their children that they can do great things with their life. The problem is this: what happens if everyone else around the child is saying otherwise?

For example, I grew up extremely poor. My father was the only one that worked, and my mother never could work outside the home simply because my parents could not afford a babysitter for the three of us. Although we got food stamps on the 10th of each month, the hundred dollars they provided for a family of five did little to feed us. I can recall that my younger brother and I would stare at the calendar and count down the days until the next set of food stamps would arrive because they often ran out a week or two before the next set came in the mail. Even when we did have them, we rarely got to eat anything except beans or potatoes. Heck, we often ate cereal for all three meals, and that was only if my parents were lucky enough to have gotten in the line early enough to receive the cheese and powdered milk hand-outs before they ran out.

Nevertheless, no matter how broke we were, my parents always encouraged us to go to college so that we could do something with our lives. The problem was that when I went to school, there were certain teachers, one certain librarian, etc. that told us that "poor people will always be poor and will never do anything with their lives". The librarian went so far as to make fun of the kids that had food stamps and encouraged the other kids to do the same. I can remember going home and telling my mother what she had said in school, and asked her if it was true that poor people cannot do anything in life. Of course, she always tried to keep us motivated, even in high school when the guidance counselors did not even encourage or discuss college funding with the poorer students such as myself. We were pretty much left to figure things out for ourselves, and many of my friends chose low-paying jobs simply because they did not know they could do anything else or actually believed that they were never going to be anything in life. So, how can one stay motivated in life when others seem to do everything in their power to stomp out the light that illuminates their hopes and dreams?

Well, I am not sure.