Your only true limitations are those you place upon yourself
Growing up in the south, I heard many stories and was lied to many times. The stories I heard of was about the accepted fact that black men were either destined for jail, the graveyard or limited to working as a farm hand or in the local cotton gin. I heard these stories from both blacks and whites and after a while began to believe them and settle in for what I was destined to do. What changed was among those stories was the fact that as a black man, it would be a miracle to even graduate high school. Like all children growing up, I dreamed of that big house with that white picket fence surrounding it and being able to walk out on my porch and be addressed as mister instead of boy. To be able to purchase what I wanted when I wanted and do for my mother more than she had ever done for me. I wanted her to be proud of the boy that she had raised and the man I had become. It was my desire to not have her want for anything and not have to work so h...