Читать книгу Driven Class America - Cory Psy.D. Ash - Страница 5

While I was away trying my hand in college, my dad received orders to go to Germany. So off they went, my mother, father, and nephew TJ, who is my adopted brother. I still had a bit of money left in my trust fund so Erica and I found a place to raise our son Eric. Hah, that was simple enough; so I thought! The idea sounded better in my head.

We found a place it was a two bedroom town house. We worked at being a family. I found a job and enrolled at the community college. The technology boom was still raging on at this time. I think I had recovered my strength, focus, and ambition. I began taking more technology and programming classes. I had my groove back!

One Saturday as I searched the classifieds for a job to put these acquired skills to use, I had found it. It was an opportunity to enter a career development program for computer programmers at Total Systems, a Synovus company. This was great I could take the aptitude test, hopefully pass it, and let this company finish developing me into a career computer programmer. I signed up right away! My test schedule was mailed to my address. Email wasn’t widely used back then. It was 1999 and the Y2K bug was coming!

Erica and I opened the letter together and read it over twice. I had been scheduled to take the aptitude test on a Wednesday. Only those who passed would be interviewed further. I was advised on the day of test that my initial test results looked promising. A drug test was scheduled for Friday. Easy enough I had been weed free now for longer than 30 days. Friday I took the test and life continued as usual. Two weeks passed before I knew the outcome. However, it finally came, the phone call. The lady on the other end said that I had scored the highest that they had seen on this aptitude test. I had heard this before you’re a smart kid….yadda yadda yadda. Being smart isn’t paying the bills though. I thought yeah lady tell me what’s the next step!

We scheduled an interview time for the next Tuesday. The big day came. I went to the appointment in this beautiful glass cathedral campus with long hallways and sterile corporate furniture. The interviewer never came out. I was confounded three days later a letter arrived in the mail. It said that I had a moral turpitude problem and according to GA state law they would pass on hiring me. This was garbage, how could they judge me when they did not know me? I paid my restitution, did my community service, and completed my probation. Now it seemed the law prevented me from getting a chance and allowing me to change my circumstances.

What now? Are my priorities to continue to go to school and change my circumstances for my new family? My friends and weed addition was still around. Self medicating was easier to accept then to fight on. I grew callous and accepted that I was a reflection of my circumstance instead of reflecting determination on my circumstances. I accepted set back for a couple of months. Then I decided to break out of my funk. I had to change.