I Don't Wish Nobody to Have a Life Like Mine #4

For the post I want to focus on the idea of loss of innocence because obviously these kids who are in jail loss their innocence in one way or another. Throughout this whole book, I have been meeting different people in jail and reading their story's. The one thing I've been most interested in as how these people made the leap from innocence to committing crimes. For almost all of the people mentioned in the book, they have no had the best childhood. Ranging from their parents being involved in gangs, to their parents dying when they were very young, to being in and out of foster homes. None of that is easy. But their was one kid who everyone went to so he could write their letters to the judge, Eddie. He was not from the ghetto, living pay check to pay check, and involved in a gang, selling drugs. He was from a rich suburb of Scarsdale, and his father was a big lawyer there. One thing from his past that was hard on him was his mother disappearing when he was six. The most interesting thing I read was that he really was not fit for jail, "He had to remember to yank his pants down his butt, not pull them up;to slouch and shuffle when he walked; to curse. And he had to work on not calling out the answers in class or getting interested in a lesson"(Chura 132). He did not lose his innocence because he got caught up with the wrong group of people. Instead he lost his innocence waiting and wishing for his mom to come back, "When he was younger it as as though he was being bad in order to force his mother out of hiding and straighten him out"(Chura 132). Eddie was an intelligent guy who cared about people. He wanted to help the other guys, he listened to them and he cared about their future. He really didn't have much of a place in jail. He knew better, but it almost seemed like he lost himself trying to find his mother. When his mother left and he became old enough to understand, he tried to be someone he was because apart of him was missing. So he sagged his pants and got ready for his future in jail, helping the other inmates out.