Humans of Parsippany | Teen Ink

Humans of Parsippany

February 5, 2024
By mollymautone26 BRONZE, Parsippany, New Jersey
mollymautone26 BRONZE, Parsippany, New Jersey
3 articles 0 photos 0 comments

“I think it was just sometimes always feeling like I was the odd one out. Kids would always talk behind like your back and things like that. My parents kinda just told me not to pay attention to it, so I really just didn’t, but I don’t think I realized until middle school or 5th grade that people are not nice. Kids are not nice. Using an example, like school lunch. Everyone buys school lunch- but there were a select amount of us who never did. We always took from home, but that was the uncommon thing, so you’d be picked on for something like that. Taking your lunch to school shouldn't be something that impacts your self-esteem, but it does. It does. You’re a kid, you don’t know any better and if someone says something mean to you, you internalize it over time and you believe what they’re saying. I think not letting all of those things impact your self-esteem, is really hard, and you have to sometimes rebuild it as you get older. I think that's kinda what I had to do. I think that times have changed in the sense that there's a lot more diversity around the country and I think that Harsh and I specifically picked a town where there was diversity, so that our kids didn’t have to feel like the odd ones out. The fact that there is a decent Indian community in Parsippany didn’t sway us against Parsippany, but we also didn’t want to be in a town where 90% of the school was Indian, because at the same time, we wanted to make sure that they are exposed to different people. Different thoughts. So I don’t think I’m as worried for them, but obviously, not every opportunity is equal, so you just hope that you support them as much as you can to achieve the goals that they want to achieve.- Finding out that I was pregnant with twins, quite literally, our life changed overnight. I obviously got married, but that was a gradual build. Like you know that you're dating someone. You’re engaged. You're going to get married. With them, it's two brand new living beings that are in your life, two different personalities, everything. Religiously, we’re told that the things that happen to us in our life, happen to us for a reason. There are a combination of things that you may have done in your past life or things that you have done in this life that may have been good or bad that impact the good or bad that come to you. Currently, I think that messaging has came with me, because when something happens to me, I’m not necessarily reactive about it, I’m more so introspective about it.”


The author's comments:

This piece of writing is a live interview from a mom and daughter living in Parsippany, New Jersey. She tells her story about growing up feeling like she was the "odd one out" and what her life is like now.


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