There are choices you have to make not just once

There are choices you have to make not just once

Nobody had books at home. My dad was a very educated person, so he would have books at home. All Spanish books. That helped. Most of my homies had no books at home.

We [people] all need each other. Gangs do try to fill that void - but they can't do what healthy, balanced, and coherent families and communities can do. Let's strengthen our core relationships from the start - and all the way through a young person's life. This is the best way to avoid the growth of deadly and crime-involved gangs.

Gangs have always existed - they are primarily a community a young men trying to find intensity, meaning, a path to the outer world (outside of home) that most tribal groupings addressed with rituals, rites of passage, initiation ceremonies. We’ve lost this knowledge as a culture.

Gangs exist when there are lots of empties in a person, in family, in community. It points out how we need to do more to bring real art, passions, teachings, caring, and resources into the emptiness of young peoples' lives.

Nobody supported me; my family thought I had gone crazy. They thought, you crazy gangster, you crazy drug addict, now you want to be a writer? That's it! They totally gave up on me after that.