Undergraduate / My passion for knowledge has been nurtured fiercely since infancy, magnifying every passing moment [10]

Prompt #1

Describe the world you come from - for example, your family, community or school - and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations

----PLEASE let me know what I can do to make this less about me, and more about my world and what I love. Thank you. Due date VERY soon. Help!!!

UC prompt 1 - Your world and Aspirations.

My mother always becomes angry and hurt when I choose to go with my father and his family of loud, in-your-face, stubborn, conservative Cubans for the holidays. It's not as though I love my father over my mother; but being home alone with her eventually leads to us clashing dramatically - with me serving as her emotional punching bag. Our fights usually start with my mother crying: "You never want to be with me! What did I ever do to you?"

I have always been extremely disappointed by my tumultuous relationship with my mother, especially knowing her past (and the fact that she is my mother). She is the daughter of Holocaust survivors, and was abused and neglected by parents traumatized and broken from their past. When she eventually met my father and attempted to start a family of her own, two of her children failed to live past infancy. She has had increasingly detrimental financial and medical difficulties, and hardly has any family still alive - none of whom even reside in the States. I know I would be some kind of former-shell-zombie if I went through half of the things she has; however, even though I am aware of the chain of events that led to cause our inharmonious relationship; I have unfortunately grown distant and bitter towards my mother. Once I arrive home from school, I go straight to my room, avoiding contact with her, and either open a book, or put my pen to paper to make everything else simply shut up. Escaping into a world of words - whether it was crafted by me or not - seems to be the immortal solace I constantly resort to; and once I delve into my schoolwork I forget about home altogether, and become placed into a state of being where I feel productive and capable.

Despite our antagonistic situation I am grateful to my mother because she understood how important it was that I receive a good education. She found out about an obscure charter called Renaissance Arts Academy, an institution that has completely changed the way I think. It is a school that NEVER allowed me to be complacent with my intellect, a school of advisors who constantly told me, "You are never done." Since Renarts is such a small community, there is no way for a student to slip behind or shy away. From day one, each advisor pushed me to achieve more than what was expected--and they expected quite a lot. Since learning has been one of the only things I have ever felt good doing, Renarts continues to be one of the most prominent places in my life. And because learning fills me with a sense of success and hope at being able to have the possibility of a life opposite of what I have now, I must not only pay homage to my mother for inadvertently giving me the motivation, but for introducing me to a place that matured me enough to see the chain of grief we were both links on. I now truly recognize her suffering and I am now sensible enough to strive to break this chain, and move onto a path of fulfillment and success.

So I do have to thank my mother - exceedingly. She gave up much for me, and has gone beyond the call of a mother many times. She planted the seeds of my liberal ideals and constructed the unyielding foundation upon which the rest of me is molded. She led me to a school that has raised my educational expectations for a university, and Renarts is right - I am not done. I have a yearning and passion for knowledge that has been nurtured fiercely since infancy, and has been magnified by every passing moment of my life. I cannot wait to continue my life long education.