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Author's mother teaches him about not hitting women.

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Author's mother teaches him about not hitting women.

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"The yell startled me, but her eyes are what I remember. "Get up to your damn room" came my mother's command from the doorway. "I told you, don't you ever put your hands on a woman!"" (Moore 5)

This is an important lesson early on in Wes's life, one he will remember due to the response given by his mother. The fear of the moment had stuck with him, but the importance of the lesson had reached his head. It leads to a life where he knows better what to do and what not to do.

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"It was like standing in a field when a powerful gust of wind suddenly blows: everything around you vanishes, all you hear is the wind filling your ears, all you feel is the wind on your skin. Your eyes tear, and sight blurs. Your mind all but empties" (Moore 14).

This quote, while Wes's father is dying, Wes is talking about how it feels to just stand there as your father loses his life. He describes everything as vanishing and getting blurry, like the world around him seemed to pause for this moment, except for him, it really did.

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Incarcerated Wes realizing that Mary can't go to college.

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Incarcerated Wes realizing that Mary can't go to college.

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"Finally, she sat him down at the edge of the bed and shared with him, in language he could understand, why school was so important. He listened intently as she explained to him the significance of being the first one in the family to go to college. She told him how much it meant to her parents that she finish. Then she explained why she had to quit" (Moore 20).

This part of the story is just the start of how (incarcerated) Wes is told to do so many things but it shown people doing otherwise. This way, he is still influenced by their actions, as actions speak louder than words do.

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Incarcerated Wes gets into a fight, and remembering Tony's advice, grabs a knife

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Incarcerated Wes gets into a fight, and remembering Tony's advice, grabs a knife

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"Before Woody could tell Wes that the police were out back, Wes was on the other side of the front door, knife in hand, hurrying to settle the score with the boy who had busted his lip" (Moore 34).

This shows that Tony's influence on Wes was really strong, and that Wes was taking great strides to follow the advice he was given from Tony. The strong influence that Tony had would turn Wes's future down the path of drug dealing, as Tony had done.

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Author Wes’s neighborhood becoming increasingly more dangerous

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Author Wes’s neighborhood becoming increasingly more dangerous

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“Our neighborhood was getting more and more dangerous; there had been a rash of break-ins in the houses around us. My mother slept in the living room to stand guard she said” (Moore 36).

This lead to his mother signing him into military school, to keep him away from all of the dangerous and often criminal activity that had begun to surround his home. It’s something that Author Wes had gotten the chance to avoid, while the other Wes had had no other options

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Incarcerated Wes gets $4000+ of drugs flushed down the toilet

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Incarcerated Wes gets $4000+ of drugs flushed down the toilet

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"Mary was not the least bit concerned with her son's new dilemma. "Not only did you lie to me but you were selling drugs and keeping them in my house! Putting all of us in danger because of your stupidity. I don't want to hear your sob story about how much money you owe" (Moore 74).

This shows that now his mother knows what path he's taking, and now that the word is out, it sort of solidifies the fact that he is walking this path in life. It also means his mother now knows that he may have been putting his home in danger by keeping the drugs in his mothers house.

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Author Wes gets sent to the military school 

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Author Wes gets sent to the military school 

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“I knew my mother was considering sending me away, but i never thought she’d actually do it”(Moore 87).

This shows that moore wasn't realizing that his mother was going to send him, but even though it seemed like a negative at the time, its his mother doing what she thinks will best help moore in his future and in his life, and eventually she is shown to be correct

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Author Wes does more in academics while in the military academy.

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Author Wes does more in academics while in the military academy.

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“Just as military school had slowly grown on me, so had academic life. I actually liked reading now” (Moore 130).

This further shows the decision to send Wes off to the military academy as being the best decision for his future, as he became more into things like reading and educational things, avoiding the life of crime and drugs that unfortunately surrounded his home city and the area he grew up in. The difference in environment prevented the negative influence from reaching Wes, effectively causing him to avoid it altogether.

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Incarcerated Wes tries to provide and care for his children

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Incarcerated Wes tries to provide and care for his children

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“Wes had to reconsider what it meant to be a father. He wanted to protect his young daughter, shelter her” (Moore 143).

“He stayed at job corps center so he could provide a better life for his kids” (Moore 144).

Wes tries to make a living outside of the streets, not doing anything that could be considered criminal activity and showimg that he really honestly cares for the children he has and wants to raise the, right. He keeps working to provide for these kids and their mothers, even if it’s difficult with the amount of money he makes.

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"As the backing soda swirled in the rapidly heating pot, Wes held the plastic bag with both hands and poured in nine ounces of cocaine"(145).

This is where incarcerated Wes gives up on what he has been working on for months in job corps because he realizes that what he is doing wont give him as much money as he thought in a fast way so he ended up falling back to the habits of using drugs because drugs give you money fast and easy money. He also want to take care of his family and with everyone nagging him about money he lose his patience and goes the easy way.

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Incarcerated Wes is sentenced to life in prison.

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Incarcerated Wes is sentenced to life in prison.

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“He had spent the last year sitting in a cell waiting for this day. With the knowledge of the sentences his brother and the other two defendants had received, he’d known his fate would be the same. He would spend the rest of his life in prison” (Moore 156).

This quote acts as almost a defeat on Wes’s end, as his return to a life containing crime and drugs meant his arrest and life sentence, so that he can no longer be the way he was before.