My Life in a Nutshell Essay

Submitted By larkin16
Words: 1760
Pages: 8

I will not sit here and try to convince you that I am not a typical white girl from a conventional, white, middle class family. If I attempted to I would just being lying. However, I will not say that we were a perfect family with no problems or struggles. We were a pretty messed up family, if that is even the correct term for what we were.
My parents grew up in loving but neglectful homes. They were given everything they could've wanted in life, but we're never given a chance to be loved and appreciated fully. I truly believe this was the basis of their choices. They were both involved in drugs and alcohol. Inhibitions were lost and without clear thought, my mom soon realized she was pregnant with me at seventeen. It's a ridiculous notion to think that at my age my mom had to give birth to a daughter. Her "culture", her peers, all pressured her into abortion or giving me up. It was all too common for a crazy teenager to have a kid, especially for those who really couldn't support one. I sympathize with my mother for considering the options. After all, I'm not too sure I would be able to support a child at this age either. She was and still is an incredible woman for keeping me and not only that but she completely changed herself to take care of me. Her culture was in a realm of addiction, meaningless relationships and hard rock. Having to leave it all would be the equivalent of a man leaving his Islamic family to be an atheist or a Christian. It was a difficult transition for her to do but somehow she persisted.
My family has always had a cataclysmic role in my life. They have stuck around with me the longest and know me more extensively than I even know my own self. Although my parents do not hold the cleanest slate, they have taught me the importance of guarding myself and my morals. I truly believe that you learn from your mistakes and that by having to go through hardships, it better enables you to give someone else a better chance at their own life. For me, my parents have used their own previous indiscretions to show me the consequences of a lack of judgment in my life. Unfortunately, I have also come to terms that no one can truly learn such a lesson as such without going through a few mistakes of their own. Throughout these last two and a half years of high school, I have realized that everyone is subject to change. People leave your life, new people enter in replacement of those who left, and some have been and always will be around. I have all too many recently leave my life. The tighter I hold on to people, the easier they seem to fall through my fingers. I have lost family members to accident and disease, friends to other people and pride has pushed many of my closest confidants to their own devices. However difficult it was to lose someone, each person helped to form my view of both the world and myself. I remember distinctly how much my Grandee loved me. She was my dad’s stepmom, and she lived in a bed and breakfast, that she ran, in Dallas, Texas. We called her Grandee because her first name was Sandee and she always was going about how she was “too young to be a grandma or nana”. No matter who you were or where you came from, Grandee was always inviting you into the house for sweet tea and apricot scones. In her hand was always a glass of deep, red wine and she was always dressed in a black dress with silver jewelry and cheetah print flip flops. If ever was a hospitable and overwhelmingly kind woman in the world, it was my Grandee. The way she would just sit and listen to people was unspeakable. I could talk her ear off for hours and she would just ask to hear more. My passion for people stems directly from her model of generosity.
Through both the struggles of my parents’ addiction and my Grandee’s hospitality and amiability, I believe my calling in life is to be a drug and alcohol rehabilitation counselor. I have a rare experience of being around the effects of drugs and seeing the destruction it