Only a sister can feel her brothers silent pain and hold his hand until he becomes strong again. This is what I would tell myself everyday, and I lived through it like it was my religion. It had always been hard for Cody to make friends and fit in. He wasn't your average Joe, he loved farming, fishing, animals, but most of all, he loved his family. We were inseparable and we looked so much alike that people thought we were twins. I think that is the hardest part of continuing on without him. The same last name, the same facial features, the same eye color and hair color. We even talked the same and had the same sarcastic attitude. I will never forget the first day I managed to build the courage to finally go back to school. The looks on everyones faces, the whispers behind my back, and people ignoring me like the plague. I told myself that these were normal, and that they were just giving me space. To be completely honest with you, I found peace in the silence. The only person who ever managed to fill the silence was Cody. The rest of the three months of school were rather tough. Normally, I would always place first in my class, I made straight A's, and always rubbed it in on how I got a point or more higher than he did. I couldn't find the energy to do very much after he gained his wings. This was until we received progress reports before the end of semester. I had my semi-normal grades but they were a lot lower, with an exception of one. My history class averaged out to a 32....a THIRTY TWO. My heart pounded so hard and then I was ready to accept defeat. We had a student-teacher conference and my history teacher explained that I had some things I didn't turn in and gave me extra credit opportunities. I accepted and thanked him for this kind gesture. Later that night I opened my history text book for the first time in two months and a note was sticking out of page 413. It was a note from Cody that read "Think of me when I make a higher grade on my history exam than you booger boo!" Not only was the note significant, but the page number 413, was as well, Cody was born on April 13. I laughed and then I cried. What was I doing with my life? I knew that Cody would not want that for me, so I began to work. I worked harder in all of my classes and brought my grades up from mediocre to excellent. That year I won highest average of my class, and I did it for Cody. For every year after, I vowed to work hard for the legacy of both of us and have continued to place first in my class. The best advice I could ever give someone is, don't give up on your life trying to preserve what you have left. They would not want you to go down that path and feel the things that they do. Work hard and create great things to leave in a legacy for you, as well as them, and please, never forget that they love you so much. It's hard not to be down on ourselves, but with time you will heal. This is a terrible thing to go through, but you are never alone.

Growing up, it was not easy being considered as a minority. The bad name calling, the deranged looks upon peoples faces, and the feeling of insecurity. Regardless of these circumstances, my mom, dad and sister did their best to drown these things out. However, this one encounter really shaped my perspective on how cruel the world could really be. My mother is Caucasian and Cherokee Indian, while my father is hispanic. I will never forget the day that my abuela (my dads mother) came shopping with my mother and I. She was excited to finally get the chance to come see us. She was delayed in this process because she was getting her citizenship, as well as, taking English classes because her English was not very good. We decided to go into this boutique to look for new school clothes. This was one of our good years, where we could afford a new pair of school shoes and pants that didn't have holes in them. My mother entered and was immediately greeted by the women by the register, but when I walked in holding my abuela's hand, we were greeted with dirty looks. She shrugged it off and we continued to browse. This was, until we felt as if someone had been watching us. Not too much surprise, it was the women who had given us a dirty look when we walked in. She had been following us around the entire store and was making us feel extremely uncomfortable. I had let go of my abuela's hand and ran to hug my mother for comfort. The lady lunged at me and gripped my arm so hard that I fell into the stack of shoes next to me. My mother had turned around to see this and was not very pleased at the sight. When she confronted the lady about it, the lady stated that my abuela and I had been "following" her and we were trying to steal her purse. She then went into detail on how "our people" were nothing but trouble and how she should call the cops with hopes that we would get deported to "go back to our own country." My mother was outraged and its safe to say that from that day forward, the women may have been more considerate of her customers. It is also safe to say that we never went back there. From that day forward, I vowed to never take anything I had for granted, nor judge before I knew the whole story. This day will forever stay as a constant reminder of how people can be and it will serve as motivation to create a positive outlook for people like me. We should not be scared to strive for great things nor should we be scared to stand up for ourselves and "our people." It gave me the strength to make my family proud, as they are not so blessed to have the opportunities that I do. I will not allow anyone to take my pride away from me.

The American Dream is something that one could only hope to achieve. Many people view it as having a good life, good job, good social status. However, there is more to the American Dream than that. Living in America is one to the biggest blessings to people with different ethnicities. For my family, the American Dream was my grandmother escaping Mexico with her eldest 2 kids. She promised to make sure they received good education and had a positive homestead. The American Dream was owning her first property with the little wage she had saved up back home. She would meet a rancher, he would sell her 2 goats, 2 hogs, and 1 Angus cow. Later on, he would steal her heart and they would get married and have 10 more children. She came over here with very little, but always kept her promises to her children. She now has 28 grandchildren, 13 great grandchildren and our family continues to grow everyday. There are wide ranges of jobs that each of us have either established or have created on our own. Many of us did not receive the opportunity to attend college, as we shipped out to the oil fields, military, trucking, or simply stayed to work the family farm. My family has created their own little world. This way, we can always be there for one another and put our all back into the community we live in. The whole block is owned by my cousins, aunts, uncles, and sister. We own our own grocery/convient store that sits on the corner. The park is even named after my grandfather. All of these things are the true meaning of the American Dream. It took my grandmother 18 years to establish citizenship, but she did it. She even managed to create her own little empire along the way. I aspire to go into the medical field as a pharmacist. I would go all the way and receive my doctrine degree. I always wanted to give back the the community that has given to me so much in my life. I would use my degree to open my own pharmacy along the lines of our little village. I would make sure that everyone would have affordable medicine and health care practices available. There are so many things that I aspire to do with my degree. I would even love to be able to travel back to Mexico and help my family that was not as fortunate to escape and have a taste for the American liberties. This is just one of many steps I plan to take on this path.