ADVERSITY 5/2/13

ad*ver*si*ty [ɜdvɜːsətɪ] n., Pl.-ties. 1. A state of hardship(s) or affliction, misfortune. 2. A calamitous event.

It's pretty well proven that all humans have lived the above definition(s). Although all don't measure up in scale, we all know to well "misfortune", don't we? Whether it being you forgot, left or didn't remember to do something. The most harshest or all misfortune is the losing of a beloved person we knew. The affliction it wrought on us, our whole life... a calamitous event that will forever be ingrained in our minds.

Hearing the word can mean different things to different people, going through different adversities.

For one person it can conjure up hardships and pain that came with overcoming this mountain called adversity. No doubt they traversed this road and even though they were victorious it brings great pain and affliction to them to think back what they've been through to get where they are and what was lost to gain what they got. Yet for others it brings a great sense of satisfaction, it brings a smile to their face. They bask in the knowledge that confronted with life's "ditches" they overcame them and came out stronger.

What is it about these few ones? I say few for the simple fact that there really is only a handful of people who climbed tremendous odds against them. Who knew that death is at their door... waiting to take them. This "thing" that they have, when did they get it? Are they born with it? People in urban slums i:e, barrios, ghettos have a bunch of odds stacked against them. Let's be honest here, there's not enough jobs for all, children in poverty are even known to have physiological effects. 1 with blue collar jobs abundant (most likely though, NOT) concentrated in low income communities, what future does that hold for us? A life of hard labor and for a majority a future to prison?

Adversity. It comes in many shapes and forms but for those that flock to the highest altitude they're in a place all by themselves. To differentiate, the bourgeois family that can't take a vacation due to "budget" constraints does not face adversity. On the other hand the single mom that somehow finds a way to put a meal in her kid(s)' faces and knows REAL adversity. The individual that had the world handed to them does not know hardship. We all know that snobby type. That person who doesn't appreciate what they have till it's gone (and even then they still don't).

The "glory" goes to the individual who had to work hard to make ends meet, 2 jobs and countless hours of lost sleep to see their dreams arise from the realm of fantasy.

Adversity is my blanket. Every night I cover myself with it. It is the stone in which I sharpen myself, what world would this be without adversity? I've heard before that a person wouldn't know bravery if he didn't know cowardice. How can we know one without knowing the other? All go through adversity but few can hold it, even rarer is those that can define it.

Notes

So rich, so poor - why is it so hard to end poverty in America. Peter Edelman. The New Press, 2012. Pgg 174. See Chapter 6 and 7.