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Lost a very dear nephew (Larell) to gun violence in September 2006, to be exact on my mother’s birthday,  September 28th.  Because we are such a close  family, losing my nephew has devastated the family.  We’re the kind of family that gets together for anniversaries,  birthdays and when those run out "just because".   As time passed,  I began to ask myself, "what could I do to turn such a tragic loss into something positive", that could not only help my family, but other families as well.  It started to seem that every week, there was another senseless murder.  I began to ask myself "what has gone wrong?"  "what’s so different about when I grew up"?  

It is quite clear that one of the problems families face today is not being able to spend a lot of "quality" time together.  Everybody is going in different directions.  We used to sit down at the table and eat together, lots of trouble I’m sure was averted at that dinner table.  We talked about school, if something was bothering someone, how to handle certain situations, and mainly that’s where we learned how to treat other human beings.  And very early on we were held accountable for our actions.  That’s where the soil was fertilized, and the seeds were planted; how to respect yourself and others, having compassion for other human beings, having the utmost respect for our elders.  With all that fertilizer and those strong roots, no way you would have been driven to pull a gun and kill a neighbor’s son or daughter, we interacted too much as a community and loved one another too much for that to happen.  The consequences of doing something wrong haunted you for life,  it seems like you had to go up against the whole community,  your parents, your friends parents, your siblings, the person who you had wronged, the teacher, principal,  Block club and  the list just goes on. 

That being said, I saw this article in an AARP newsletter about a contest.  The contest was to write and essay about " your dream job."    

I am the Career Changer Dream Job Winner and here’s my winning essay. 

I’m all smiles in Chicago    

"My dream job would be to open a center where I could help underprivileged families.  A place where families could come in and have dinner together, worship together, learn together, enjoy recreational activities together, dance together and just get back to plain old family fun.   This center would promote the "can do" mentality.  I grew up on the West Side of Chicago and also lived in the Robert Taylor Homes.  I interviewed in l983 for a typist position in one of the cities largest law firms.  I basically had a high school diploma and the attitude of "can do" even though I heard repeatedly what I "couldn’t do".  I have been with the firm since l983, almost 25 years.  My title now is Paralegal Supervisor.  I would love to work with the young men and women to encourage them to follow whatever path they decide to do.  I visualize this center as having a place where parents can come in if they need to talk, where a child who is being encouraged to join a gang will feel comfortable, some place where people are not judged, just loved.  I lost a nephew to gun violence in 2006 and I think it’s time to get back to the basics.  I would put this center in one of the most needy neighborhoods.  Life has been good to me and I have been very fortunate and blessed.  This would be my way of giving back and also going back to the basics that were instilled in me.  Families are in crisis these days, and some people do not have the resources nor do they know where to go.  I’d love to be able to provide those resources.