Does this ps have potential?
Posted: Sun Jul 01, 2012 1:16 am
obviously very rough, still needs a paragraph or two at the end...if I decide to work with this
I thought to myself, ”this must be the coolest place on Earth,” as a starry eyed fifth grader, half of me in awe of the immaculate building surrounding me and the other half enthused that I was missing school for the day. As I walked hand-in-hand with my mother down the halls of Latham & Watkins LLP for take your son to work day, my dreams of becoming the next Kobe Bryant or Barry Sanders instantly subsided, replaced with ambitions of becoming a lawyer, and to inevitably work in a cool building, just like my mom. I promptly proclaimed to my mother that I had decided to forgo the NBA draft to become a lawyer instead, being the supportive mother that she is, she simply looked at me and said, “OK xxx,” touched my head and graced me one of those warm, comforting smiles that mothers always seem to execute so well—the perfect assurance that whatever I wanted to do, I could do it.
My mother’s support for my endeavors has always been a driving factor for my life pursuits – but this all changed my sophomore year of college. I still remember the day that drastically stymied my comfortable little world in xxx. It was March 11, 2011—the day before I was due to fly home to xxx California for spring break—when my mother called me to tell me that my sister would be picking me up from the airport the following day because she hadn’t been feeling well as of late. She said we’d talk about it once I arrived home and insisted that I shouldn’t worry and that we’d discuss it the following day. My mother, a very health conscious woman, didn’t get sick, she raised my sister and I by herself for the first 13 years of my life and not once could I ever remember her ever getting sick—it simply did not happen.
The following 24 hours are a swift blur that I’ll never forget. Deeply concerned about my mother, I dropped my suitcases at the front door and found her in bed. The hour-long conversation that followed is still, to this moment, the most grounding experience of my life. My mother hadn’t been working for the past two weeks; she had all the symptoms of Meniere’s disease—an enigmatic condition that has no cure or cause. I was shocked, upset, and confused to find out that my mother had been showing symptoms for months, but didn’t tell me. Her excuse: she didn’t want to disrupt my studies with her problems at home. Not only is my mother, the main breadwinner and support system of our household sick and bedridden, but we also were losing our house to foreclosure—a severe problem, but at the time seemed of little importance in comparison to my mother’s health.
Throughout the next few months I had to make some very difficult decisions. I decided to leave my close friends and transfer to xxx with an academic scholarship and to move back home to deter some of the costs that college can burden on a family with financial difficulties. My decision to move back home was something I felt I had to do; I knew I had to return home to help the woman who had refused to do anything less than give me 100% support: now it was my turn to help her in anyway I could. My family grew closer than I could have ever envisioned and my personal growth, both academically and emotionally grew immensely.
My ambitions to become a lawyer did not subside, although my desire to work in a big building has been replaced with a less than general interest in public service—specifically public health and environmental issues. Although I’ve had a very strong interest in law at a young age—even before I knew what a lawyer did (lucky once I found out what being a lawyer actually meant it still interested me)—I’ve been very fortunate to directly work with a broad array of professionals including accountants, grant writers, program managers, human resource officers, environmental specialists, business managers, and a variety of different attorneys and have had the opportunity to question them about the intricacies of their chosen professions.
I thought to myself, ”this must be the coolest place on Earth,” as a starry eyed fifth grader, half of me in awe of the immaculate building surrounding me and the other half enthused that I was missing school for the day. As I walked hand-in-hand with my mother down the halls of Latham & Watkins LLP for take your son to work day, my dreams of becoming the next Kobe Bryant or Barry Sanders instantly subsided, replaced with ambitions of becoming a lawyer, and to inevitably work in a cool building, just like my mom. I promptly proclaimed to my mother that I had decided to forgo the NBA draft to become a lawyer instead, being the supportive mother that she is, she simply looked at me and said, “OK xxx,” touched my head and graced me one of those warm, comforting smiles that mothers always seem to execute so well—the perfect assurance that whatever I wanted to do, I could do it.
My mother’s support for my endeavors has always been a driving factor for my life pursuits – but this all changed my sophomore year of college. I still remember the day that drastically stymied my comfortable little world in xxx. It was March 11, 2011—the day before I was due to fly home to xxx California for spring break—when my mother called me to tell me that my sister would be picking me up from the airport the following day because she hadn’t been feeling well as of late. She said we’d talk about it once I arrived home and insisted that I shouldn’t worry and that we’d discuss it the following day. My mother, a very health conscious woman, didn’t get sick, she raised my sister and I by herself for the first 13 years of my life and not once could I ever remember her ever getting sick—it simply did not happen.
The following 24 hours are a swift blur that I’ll never forget. Deeply concerned about my mother, I dropped my suitcases at the front door and found her in bed. The hour-long conversation that followed is still, to this moment, the most grounding experience of my life. My mother hadn’t been working for the past two weeks; she had all the symptoms of Meniere’s disease—an enigmatic condition that has no cure or cause. I was shocked, upset, and confused to find out that my mother had been showing symptoms for months, but didn’t tell me. Her excuse: she didn’t want to disrupt my studies with her problems at home. Not only is my mother, the main breadwinner and support system of our household sick and bedridden, but we also were losing our house to foreclosure—a severe problem, but at the time seemed of little importance in comparison to my mother’s health.
Throughout the next few months I had to make some very difficult decisions. I decided to leave my close friends and transfer to xxx with an academic scholarship and to move back home to deter some of the costs that college can burden on a family with financial difficulties. My decision to move back home was something I felt I had to do; I knew I had to return home to help the woman who had refused to do anything less than give me 100% support: now it was my turn to help her in anyway I could. My family grew closer than I could have ever envisioned and my personal growth, both academically and emotionally grew immensely.
My ambitions to become a lawyer did not subside, although my desire to work in a big building has been replaced with a less than general interest in public service—specifically public health and environmental issues. Although I’ve had a very strong interest in law at a young age—even before I knew what a lawyer did (lucky once I found out what being a lawyer actually meant it still interested me)—I’ve been very fortunate to directly work with a broad array of professionals including accountants, grant writers, program managers, human resource officers, environmental specialists, business managers, and a variety of different attorneys and have had the opportunity to question them about the intricacies of their chosen professions.
I mean it, as a mom it's something that would make me tear up.