Initial Impressions

I am reading the memoir Always Running.  I am expecting this book to have an emotional impact on whoever reads this novel.  Luis Rodriguez grew up in eastern Los Angeles and wasn’t necessarily involved with the gang warfare, but the people around him that he knew and loved weren’t as fortunate as he was.  Some of his close friends were killed throughout his childhood and it took a lot of courage to pursue a career as a Chicano poet after having such a large struggle as a child.  He had a lot of bad influences around him and I am interested to read about how he reacted to all of this.  He witnessed shootings beatings and arrests throughout his life and still persevered in his society.  He wasn’t involved in crime which I’m sure was hard to do considering half of the city was.  His parents were immigrants and didn’t have much money so it was an even larger struggle to make it with his living conditions.  I am anticipating he was never able to escape poverty as a child and he was constantly moving due to his lack of money.  He probably had to make many decisions alone in order to protect himself and his family.  He was able to overcome all of the downsides of his childhood and make the best of it and made a living through education and his ability to put words together and have an impact on the people listening to him.  This memoir will be sad, but I look forward to seeing how he was able to escape gang societies and become an emotionally uplifting poet.