The
older I get, the more I realize how much my opinions and beliefs have been
affected by my surroundings. It’s
funny how many times I’ve had the nature versus nurture conversations and spoke
about this exact topic without applying it to so many of my own thoughts. When I was growing up, not meeting your
potential was being middle aged and working at a fast food restaurant. That is of course assuming that working at a
fast food restaurant is a teenager’s job.
I
find myself wondering why I never thought about the opposite end of the
spectrum. Since I started working post-college,
I have always considered myself to be middle class, not knowing what that truly
means or even what upper class truly means.
I don’t think I’ve had much interaction with the upper class to know it
even if I saw it. From my perspective,
the upper class if Floyd Mayweather, Michael Jordan and the hundreds of famous
persons that I’ve seen on television.
Kanye made a song about living next to Tom Cruise, which makes me believe
that there is a section of the country exclusive to actors and the upper
class. But, what about their directors,
doctors, mechanics, etc. that are at least semi rich. Where do I fall in that spectrum? I figure that the middle-aged fast food
worker is the microscopic blip (I’m thinking about the scene at the end of Men
In Black, when the world turns out to be a marble that the giamongus alien
throws into his marble bag), but the question then become am I even a
recognizable blip?
I
can’t say that I’ve avoided this question my whole life, but I think mentally I’ve
avoided thinking about it. I’ve
questioned who would care when I die every time I see a Malcolm X poster or
hear a 2pac/Biggie reference and their memories are probably a blip in
reference to their more popular white counterparts. What would that make my memory?
This
is a lot of deep thought that ultimately leads to my current predicament. The thought of owning property is very
intimidating to me. I think about the
nice houses out in the suburbs or those that I see on television series. On King of Queens, a delivery guy and a
lawyer’s secretary own a home in NEW YORK CITY!
I wonder if that’s even possible.
Is it my lack of intelligence that makes it so hard for me to find
affordable housing outside of the hood?
I feel nervous seeing all of the foreclosures on the market from people
who thought they were middle class (just like me) until their wife got pregnant
and they realized they couldn’t live off of one salary or they lost their job
that they were counting on and realized that there wasn’t another one waiting
on them.
So,
now I’m asking myself questions. If life
is temporary, why do I need to own property in the first place? I’d love to have something to call my own
until I can no longer afford it and it’s taken from me, but what’s the
point? Why pour my life savings into a
property that I would in turn have to spend valuable life time tending to an
ultimately, it can be taken from me after one unfortunate event and I have
nothing to show for it.
I’ve
heard so many people say that the above is the reason they don’t want to work
for a company or a person and they want to work for themselves. Well, there are a million people in this
society that want a million dollars and very few of that million have it. Is it optimistic or irresponsible to think
that I’m going to be that one? And what qualifies
me to be that one as opposed to anyone else?
I guess I’m just torn and frustrated with life. I hated that while I was going to school for
my Masters degree, and working full time, I ended up living in the projects,
overpaying for rent and I refuse to be in another situation like that. The only problem is that even though I
recognized the problem from my past I never found a solution. As a former math teacher, I feel like I’ve
figured out what the problem is, but I’m stuck staring at it because I don’t
know how or where to start finding a solution.
