Many of my close friends have experienced life within the confines of a jail cell. As a youth I thought it was normal to have an array of friends living a common existence in and out of prison, it wasn’t until I started socialising in different social circles that I realised that this was not the norm. I could comfortably say an excess of 60 of my friends have been inside and many times I narrowly avoided being locked away myself. To many it may seem like I associated with misguided people and I guess they’d be right. But growing up around the lost ones, taught me many valuable life lessons and I honestly would not choose to walk another path. We share many common traits some of them are unshakable. I grew up with varied so called social misfits including robbers, murderers, drug dealers, drug users and the list goes on, but truthfully most of them were/are not bad people. I don’t make excuses for the many crimes committed (especially ones that harmed the innocent), but sometimes life hands us different circumstances, contrasting terrains and alternative mindsets, which lead to outcomes that are unfathomable to the sheltered population. I for one was not given equal circumstances to the many surrounding middle class that lived behind a guarded white picket fence. Put simply, life did not seem to be fair for me and many of my comrades. Many of us went without love, guidance and positive role models to teach us the right way to live. Our family were our homies and with limited skills, we taught eachother how to survive. As a kid, immaturity sets in and a simple decision of right and wrong can sit either side of a blurred line. Many times, the right side was doing whatever it took to either ‘fit in’ or to have things that the more fortunate were awarded. We may not have made what is seen to be the right decision but inherently these skills have to either be taught or sought out and it is extremely difficult for a misguided youth to search for the unknown.
Some of us were lucky to have people to guide us in the right direction before it was too late, but others never had the opportunity. My immediate crew are the lucky ones, but all of us bare the many scars of the past. We all saw things that a human should never see and we carry this with us everyday. This enables us to have the same thought process and I have never encountered anyone that understands me like my brothers. When I am lucky enough to see them, I am blessed with shots of shared wisdom and an unconditional love that can only be brought upon by the horror of times past. These are the only people I would trust with my own life.
We lost so many people along the way, more than an average man should over a few lifetimes. I feel it is an honour and a privilege to be still standing after many narrow escapes. I now dedicate my life to teaching youth that they are better than they think or have been previously conditioned. I have an amazing team around me and I feel that inch by inch, scrap by scrap we guide their infinite intelligence. Everytime I walk into a classroom I take a piece of my brothers with me.
Thank you brothers, you know who you are.