by Angel, San Mateo
Lots of people might see me from many different perspectives. I’ve met plenty of people from many different places in my sixteen years of life. Many might say I’m a bad person with bad intentions, while many other people might say the complete opposite. When I go to school my teachers tell me I’m smart. They tell me I’m very curious.
Here in the unit, staff tells me all types of different things, one of them said, I’ve changed for the worst. Other staff tell me I have lots of potential. While working out, one staff told me I have a very strong mind because I don’t ever give up no matter how hard things get. I know my mom sees me as a good boy that’s just made bad choices. In the streets, people that don’t know me might see me as a young reckless kid. I feel like my brothers and others sometimes see me as street smart but sometimes dumb as hell too. In my circle they see me as mostly laid back and cool. I know that they see me as someone they can rely on for sure.
The system might see me as a bad kid for the community that keeps getting worse and worse over time. To keep it 100, I can’t blame them. Every time they see me it’s for something worse than the last time. My family might see me as distant from them. This is because I’m usually never home. I’m either locked up, in a group home, or in the streets.
So, over time I basically just started to fade away from family. Sometimes I miss the bond that I used to have with my siblings. We would always talk and do dumb fun things together. Back then when I was a little kid I was forever talking and had a lot of energy. I had a good relationship with damn near everybody in my family. But as I got older, things changed. I know that some of my family still might see me as a good kid. I can’t say the same thing for everybody in my family though, some of them just don’t like me. They think and say bad things about me!
My therapist is cool. She might see me as a good person to talk to or a good conversation starter. Counselors or other people that don’t really know me probably just make an assumption on me based on something they read on a piece of paper or something they have heard about me. I have noticed that lots of strangers are quick to judge people based on something that they’re not even really sure about. This is something I think is not good at all because I have learned that you shouldn’t underestimate anyone. You never really know what the next person is thinking or what the next person has been through. But anyways to get to the point, lots of people think or see different things about me, some good and some bad.
I really don’t care what people think, unless it’s people I love. People can assume anything. I know who I am. I think that for the most part I am a good person. I’ve done lots of good things in my life. For example, one time it was me and my brother, we were just outside his house then a homeless lady came up to us and asked us for money to get some food.
We both said, “Yeah, we got you.” We then gave her $50 each. It felt good to do something like that even though I told my brother she probably wasn’t going to use that money on food. We both knew it, but still we both did a good thing that day. I have many more memories of me doing good things.
I will share one more story. Back then when I was a young child, maybe like 8- or 9-years young, I had a cool bike that my mom’s friend had given her for me. I used to ride this bike to another neighborhood to kick it and chop it up with these kids that I was cool with.
So, one day I pull up over there on my bike. There was this kid I was really cool with that didn’t have a bike so I would let him use mine. That day he was telling me his mom wouldn’t buy him a bike because they didn’t have enough money to be doing that, so I told him he could keep my bike and that I would just steal myself a new one.
At first, he did not agree but then I told him I was already thinking about getting a new one. So, he said okay and was very happy to have a nice new bike. That day I went and stole a bike from somebody’s house. I then went home and told my mom I traded bikes with some kid. So overall I think I have been doing good things since I was a young boy. Many people might not see or think so, but I know I really am.