I Wonder What You See When You Look At Me

I wonder what you see when you look at me?
You see the 20’s me, but you don’t know all of me.
You see the college degree but you don’t know all of me.
We came from the South Side of Chicago, Jefferey Manor.
We didn’t have everything but we had what we needed so it didn’t matter.
It was times we had to put the water in a big bucket, put it in the microwave and heat the water for a quick bath.
It was times where we would do our laundry in the bath tub and hang it to dry.
I never went to school and talked about it. Wasn’t nothing to say. Shoot, we was happy.
I remember Moms went all out for us one Christmas, and we woke up but everything was missing.
Gone.
Moms didn’t make us feel like we were struggling. Always had clean clothes, always had food, always had each other.
I wonder what you see when you look at me?
I remember feeling like we were on vacation because we resided in a motel for some weeks.
Walking “home” from school.. wondering if my friends saw me go the opposite way of my old house.
I remember the days we didn’t have lights. House full of candles. I just feel like it was never stuff that we couldn’t handle.
I remember the days Moms would come home with a car and we were so excited for her.
I remember the day we were headed to the store but the car was gone, they took it.
She always figured it out. She always made a way out of no way.
It was something about this lady. How strong she was. How strong she made her kids be.
See it’s some things I don’t paint in this picture… this image of me.
I wonder what you see when you look at me?