During my sophomore year my family moved to Georgia. One morning my mom was about to take me to school, but when we walked outside our car wasn’t there. My parents knew made payment arrangements to pay the past due monies, but the car was repossessed. The first two weeks after we lost the car were the hardest. Every day I walked two miles to and from Stone Mountain High School. My dad and my brother also had to walk to and from their workplaces.
Furthermore, one morning as I was leaving for school I opened the front door to find an eviction notice. I cried so hard. I couldn’t bear to wake my parents and dump another burden unto their shoulders so I just laid it on the kitchen table and left. It stated that we had seven days to pay all past due rent in full or to evacuate the premises. My world was shattered and I couldn’t do anything about it.
We stayed in the apartment two weeks longer than we were allotted. This was a blessing because no one checked to see if we left the apartment, and we were able to put our belongings in storage. Okay, so we weren’t exactly homeless yet, but we had no food! I remember the night we had to eat macaroni noodles and butter or the night we had to make tuna fish. I was the only fortunate one because I went to school every day, so I ate free lunch. I felt guilty because all I could think about was my family, while I ate a sufficient hot meal.
Soon after, I had no way of getting to school because we moved to a shelter in Forest Park, GA—three cities away. The only thing about it that I was not content with was the fact that at five o’clock in the morning this bell would sound, alerting residents to get up and get ready to leave. By 5:30A.M. all rooms had to be cleaned and the residents must be in the “dining room” ready to eat and leave the shelter for the day. My family and I walked from that shelter in Forest Park to my aunt’s house in Jonesboro, which was two cities away—everyday. My dad was transferred to store closer to the shelter so that he could walk, and because his hours required him to work overnight he was unable to live in the shelter. This was the beginning of the division of my family.
My dad had to stay with my aunt while the three of us continued to walk every morning. I had to go back to school because my parents would have been in trouble for truancy, therefore I attended Jonesboro High School which meant I had to move with my aunt too. My mom was crushed. Our world was turned upside down and now our family was being torn apart one by one.
That Sunday morning, we all went to church. It seemed as if the pastor spoke just to me— to my soul. That’s when I understood why we went through everything. The lesson of Humility was what God wanted us to learn and now material things no longer mean as much.
About a week after that we got another apartment and things were a little better, but Georgia wasn’t for us. My family moved back to Florida on December 24th and lived with my sister. We lost everything, but we were all together and we started over again and now we’re living better than ever.
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