*check out my post below if you're lost on the story line or click this link: Always Running*
Luis J. Rodriguez continues the story with talking about his childhood and explaining the group that he started to hang out with. As a kid being abused by everyone, he wanted to feel powerful; and not like the victim all the time. He saw gang members and witnessed the fear they created among everyone, and he wished to be able to possess such powers so that he would no longer feel useless and pathetic. With these feelings, he joined his first gang at the age of 10 (they called it a "club"). Later on, he joined a real gang, and that's when things started to go down real fast. He started acting up at school, even though he showed promise as a good student, doing drugs and alchohol, etc. He fell in with the wrong crowd.
Basically, Luis gave in to peer pressure. Peer pressure. You've all probably heard these words many times. 'Don't give in to peer pressure, don't let others influence you into doing something you don't want to.' We've all heard this, but have we ever really understood it. Luis did the same thing we all do, he turned his shoulder and ignored the voice in his head. He didn't really want to be a cholo, he didn't want to get a tattoo at age 12. He didn't want to do a lot of the things he did, but he did it cause others told him to. His friends, his girlfriend, they all told and convinced him to do these things. Teenagers (us) don't really understand the consequences of succumbing to peer pressure. I know I still don't. Most of us have not experienced such things to make us reflect on our decisions. The closest I've come to peer pressure is being influenced by my friends to take an AP class I don't want to. Not as bad as being pressured into joining a gang. Some might say being pressured in my case would be a good thing. What do you think? Is peer pressure always good or bad? Can there be a middle ground? I think that if you surround yourselves with bad people, you'll be influenced into doing bad things. That's why you should always circle yourself around people that'll help keep you up, not push you back down. I think Luis fell in with the wrond crowd, and got so tangled up in it, he couldn't escape and had to suffer the consequences.
*I'm sorry I know this is boring you can go ahead and skip this part...
To reflect on my reading this week, I was able to catch up but as you can see by my post time I procrastinated a lot with my blog post. Again, the plot was very interesting so I was intrigued throughout the story and did not need to do any extra work. However, I may start keeping a log of certain major events because I have noticed that the author jumps back and forth through his childhood. At one point he's 12, and then he switches to tell a story of when he was 9. Regardless, I am very much enjoying my book and can't wait to start on next week's reading. Thanks for reading! See you all next week! :)