The Other Wes Moore

The Other Wes Moore is a story of two black males from Baltimore, Maryland who grew up in the inner city and dealt with struggles of poverty while growing up in an urban area.  Both Wes Moore’s grew up in single parent homes with their mothers.  The author Wes Moore’s father died while he was still young from acute epiglottis. Wes soon moved from Baltimore to New York with his mom with hopes of starting fresh.  Wes attended Riversdale a private school but had issues fitting in and got into a lot of trouble which resulted in  him being shipped off to military school. 

 The other Wes Moore’s father never really played a role in his life at all.  His father was an alcoholic who could  did not care about being in his son’s life.  Wes’s mom tried her best to accommodate his father not being around but it never really worked out.  Both Wes Moore’s hung out in the “hood” with local crews and got into trouble.  The other Wes Moor had more of a rite of passage to lead the life of a gangster because his older brother Tony was a gang leader; opposed to the author who had a few gangster friends but his mom would never allow him to follow them to the point of no return.   

The determining factor in the author Wes Moore’s life was his mother’s drive to not let her son become a statistic.  His mother loved him so much that she sent him to military school because of his bad behavior.  When Moore first started military school he had a major adjustment problem, he didn’t want to be there.  He had problem listening to his instructors, he just wanted to go back to his home in New York.  Moore took a stand for himself after Sargent Austin had a joke played on him by giving him a fake map that showed him how to get from Philadelphia all the way back to New York.  Moore learned from this experience and started to excel in Valley Forge Military Academy.

The turning point in The Other Wes Moore’s life was when he went to job Corps.  Wes’s friend Levy talk him into giving the job Corps a try, after all Wes was at a point in his life where he needed to do something productive or he knew he would have ended up dead or in jail.  When Wes was in Job Corps he actually felt like he had a chance to do something with his life and provide for his children, but when he returned home he realized his problems were very real.  This was a turning point for Wes because it symbolized which way he wanted to go with his life.  Wes stuck with what he knew and continued to sell drugs, and later got charged for killing a police officer.

The author Wes Moore had a strict upbringing his mom made sure she invest time and money into her son.  Wes had a rough childhood and dealt with many challenges like losing his father at a young age. This affected his mom so much that she decided to move to New York to have extra support from her parents. When his dad was alive he was a positive role model he had a job as a news broadcaster on a radio show and provided for his son not only financially but emotionally, like when he hit his older sister Nikki, his father made sure he talked to him and let him know exactly what he did wrong and why his mother was so upset.  Wes’s backbone was his mother, for the simple fact that he knew that at the end of the day she was the one who loved him the most and would be there for him regardless of anything that occurred.  Wes’s mothers strict but caring style influenced her son to rise above the slums of where he grew up in to become a successful black man.

Fathers not being around is sadly a norm in the ghetto, and this usually effect kids in a negative way.  The Other Wes Moore’s mom, Mary loved her son with everything she had.  Mary was a women with a dream of going to college but couldn’t for financial reasons.  Wes’s dad was an alcoholic who never acknowledged the fact that he had a son.  The few times Wes met his dad they never shared a good moment he was fatherless and had no male role model in his life besides his older brother too, who was a well-respected gang leader.  His dad not being around hurt him because he never really had any one show him how to be a man.  Wes himself had four children but struggled to be there for them the way he should have because of him serving time.

Human behavior shows that where you grew up at and the principles that were instilled in you at a young age really have major effects on your life.   In the other Wes Moore both Wes’s struggled with making the right decisions like when the author Wes Moore had tagged the wall with his knick name “Kid Kupid”.  Although Wes knew this was wrong he did it for the thrill and almost got arrested that day he learned a life lesson, that if he didn’t straighten up he would find himself in the back of police cruisers more often.  Wes dealt with challenges throughout his life but had the drive to reach for his goals.

The story is ironic, because as the author Wes Moore stated that these two males stories could have been vice versa.  I think that a major difference between the Wes Moore’s was the role models they had, the authors Wes Moore’s mother was more stern and took more action to assure by any means necessary that her son would become a good man.  The Other Wes Moore’s mom seemed to kind of accept the fact of what her son was becoming at one point.  After she found out her son was selling drugs his innocence that he barely had, since he was arrested for the knife situation was gone.  The only male role model Wes had was Tony, and although Tony tried his hardest to keep Wes out of the “game” it was inevitable.

The Other Wes Moore is a great book; I made plenty personal connections because I also grew up in an area that would be considered “the hood” in Mattapan, Boston.  Although this is a story it explained what happens in urban areas vividly.  One thought that crossed my mind when I was reading this novel is the “ghettos or hoods” everywhere are all the same.  There are only a few things that are going to help us do better and progress as a people. One is parents being there for their children and pushing them to achieve in life, two is education going to school is very important.  I know from experience a teenage kid in the “hood”, not going to school will usually find some type of trouble to get into.

A lesson that can be taken away from this novel is that we all get chances, but we should not take them for granted because you never know that one mistake you make could cost you your life.  It comes down to a decision, we have no say in where we start out at but have a major say in where we end up.  I connected to this book because we all meet people in life that are stuck in their ways and will influence you to do the same.  Some people do not progress they stay in the same place their whole life.  To make progress you actually have to work hard and try to strive for your goals.  Not only Black people but all people deal with adversity, I like to live by this saying “It’s not about what happens it’s about how you bounce back”.  This saying basically means, in life ups and downs will occur but you have to have focus and a strong mind to rise above it all and succeed.