Anthony Jackson on Paper
So this is the first real entry into my blog/journal/memory collector, and the most obvious thing to write about is ME. This could be for purely egotistical reasons, but I think it is important to describe myself in order to see where it is I am coming from. So here goes:
The straight logistics are as follows. I was born on December 26th, 1983 to Cassandra and Bernard Jackson in Savannah Georgia. My families roots are in Georgia, and more specifically Macon (small town about an hour south of Atlanta). We are unmistakably African-American, and I say unmistakably because we are neither light-brite nor fresh-off-the-boat dark. You will quickly learn that I am an offensive person to all but the most calloused of souls, but that can be discussed later. My family is as complicated as most and has its bitter moments, but there are only a few facts that need to be known about my family in reference to how I have come to be who I am.
Neither my mother nor my fathers families were wealthy in any sense. They were most likely to be considered middle of the road for a black family in those days. My mother grew up in a family of five (my mother the youngest, a fact that could explain some of her personality traits) in which there were two daughters and a son. My mothers parents had a healthy relationship and stayed together until my grandmother passed a year to this day ago. My father grew up in a house of six (in which he was the eldest child, a deciding factor in his personality as well) in which there were three sons and one daughter. My father’s parents seem to have had a turbulent relationship that was functional, and was turbulent on the part of my grandfather who was an alcoholic and a gambler at middle age. Things settled down for my grandfather, and now he is deeply religious and still married to my grandmother (although he is still a mean but clever man). My mother and father are by far the most successful of their respective households. Their children me and my sister are textbook successes, they have excellent jobs with sufficient income, and they appear to be in a happy marriage. This has been met with mild support on my mother’s side of the family, but has created a divide amongst my father and his siblings. I am much closer to my mother’s side of the family as a result of this lack of exposure than to my fathers. (FYI- My family is of the smothering type, so lack of exposure in my eyes is most likely plenty of exposure to someone else’s experience).
Back to me. I grew up youngest of two siblings in a middle class black suburban family. The only differences between my upbringing and most of typical America, is that my father is in the military and that I am black. The military background caused me to move around more often than others, and being black effected my choices of middle school as well as my perception of myself at some critical points in my life. All that can be explained later, were just sticking to the facts here. I excelled at most areas of life growing up, sports, school, making friends, all those wonderful things, and have continued to have it fairly easy to this day. I have never been so good at anything that I wished to dominate others, but I have usually been just good enough to be cocky. I was in the gifted and talented program in middle school, went to an elite public high school, received a full ride to Morehouse College, and am now a grad student at the University of Michigan. I have struggled through that academic journey at times, but these struggles were more often due to lack of effort than lack of ability. I have had four internships with top companies, and am generally in good shape to succeed in the world. But that is all on paper.
Socially, I have three best friends, my sister, Jon Hall and Ron Martin. I have many people I consider friends, and far too many acquaintances. I have never had a long relationship, but would consider myself to have had two serious ones. One with Sakina, and one with Tanya. Well, I think that takes care of the deceptive outer shell of myself, and what most people on first glance will think of Anthony Jackson. Now for the fun stuff.
The straight logistics are as follows. I was born on December 26th, 1983 to Cassandra and Bernard Jackson in Savannah Georgia. My families roots are in Georgia, and more specifically Macon (small town about an hour south of Atlanta). We are unmistakably African-American, and I say unmistakably because we are neither light-brite nor fresh-off-the-boat dark. You will quickly learn that I am an offensive person to all but the most calloused of souls, but that can be discussed later. My family is as complicated as most and has its bitter moments, but there are only a few facts that need to be known about my family in reference to how I have come to be who I am.
Neither my mother nor my fathers families were wealthy in any sense. They were most likely to be considered middle of the road for a black family in those days. My mother grew up in a family of five (my mother the youngest, a fact that could explain some of her personality traits) in which there were two daughters and a son. My mothers parents had a healthy relationship and stayed together until my grandmother passed a year to this day ago. My father grew up in a house of six (in which he was the eldest child, a deciding factor in his personality as well) in which there were three sons and one daughter. My father’s parents seem to have had a turbulent relationship that was functional, and was turbulent on the part of my grandfather who was an alcoholic and a gambler at middle age. Things settled down for my grandfather, and now he is deeply religious and still married to my grandmother (although he is still a mean but clever man). My mother and father are by far the most successful of their respective households. Their children me and my sister are textbook successes, they have excellent jobs with sufficient income, and they appear to be in a happy marriage. This has been met with mild support on my mother’s side of the family, but has created a divide amongst my father and his siblings. I am much closer to my mother’s side of the family as a result of this lack of exposure than to my fathers. (FYI- My family is of the smothering type, so lack of exposure in my eyes is most likely plenty of exposure to someone else’s experience).
Back to me. I grew up youngest of two siblings in a middle class black suburban family. The only differences between my upbringing and most of typical America, is that my father is in the military and that I am black. The military background caused me to move around more often than others, and being black effected my choices of middle school as well as my perception of myself at some critical points in my life. All that can be explained later, were just sticking to the facts here. I excelled at most areas of life growing up, sports, school, making friends, all those wonderful things, and have continued to have it fairly easy to this day. I have never been so good at anything that I wished to dominate others, but I have usually been just good enough to be cocky. I was in the gifted and talented program in middle school, went to an elite public high school, received a full ride to Morehouse College, and am now a grad student at the University of Michigan. I have struggled through that academic journey at times, but these struggles were more often due to lack of effort than lack of ability. I have had four internships with top companies, and am generally in good shape to succeed in the world. But that is all on paper.
Socially, I have three best friends, my sister, Jon Hall and Ron Martin. I have many people I consider friends, and far too many acquaintances. I have never had a long relationship, but would consider myself to have had two serious ones. One with Sakina, and one with Tanya. Well, I think that takes care of the deceptive outer shell of myself, and what most people on first glance will think of Anthony Jackson. Now for the fun stuff.
posted by Anthony Jackson at 9:09 PM
1 Comments:
pretty good for a first entry ... not as good as my blog .. but pretty good :)
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