To a kid in elementary school style and increasing your popularity level with all of the kids in your school was a definite must. Being considered one of the “cool kids” or “hanging out with the popular crowd” had consumed more of my time than I had invested into my education and learning at the time.

With only two weeks left of my precious summer left to use to the best of my disposal before I started the third grade. All was great except for the disadvantage of being the middle child, the dreaded hand-me downs. It was every kid's worst nightmare; anything and everything can become a hand-me down from clothes all the way to pencils. As the end of summer was coming to a quick and abrupt halt, I could see the end of the glorious summer memories fading away like driving into a dark tunnel. Once I got back home from a memorable and tiring day with my friends.

My mom had sat me down when I got home and said to me “now you can either go and mow the lawn or you can get all your school supplies ready and set them out on the table for me to go over and pack up with you when you’re done. Your choice.”

As I groaned in exhaustion, “okay fine I’ll come get you when I have all the school supplies on the table for you”.

As I started to shuffle through all the materials I was nearing the end of my needed supply list, which was included on a sheet that came with who my teacher was for that year, I became increasingly bored and started repeating a tongue twister my friend had showed me as quickly as I possible without getting my tongue tied, “Peter piper pickled a peck of purple peppers”. I got out loose-leaf paper, two green camo spiral notebooks, a yellow and pink highlighter and three number two wooden pencils that still needed to be sharpened. As I began to check off the items on my list I figured I had everything I needed except for one binder to hold all my school supplies and papers together in one place. As I went back into the neatly organized closet to find a binder I came to find myself not being able to find a new, unused, fresh out of the box white binder that my mom had gotten for me the past two years.

“Mom, I need your help please,” I said as I slightly escalated my voice volume.

“I’ll be out there in one minute honey, what do you need help with finding?”

“I can’t find a big binder, I looked everywhere. Where’s the ones you bought me this year? You must’ve kept them in the car or something”. As I turned my head quickly to grab the binder I soon realized that it wasn’t at all what I had thought was going to be in front of me in my mom's hands. She was about to make me use my older brothers used binder from the fourth grade that he had scribbled on with black permanent sharpie, the plastic on the front and back cover were both deformed and slightly ripped while also missing the inside plastic flaps used to hold papers. The binder was practically screaming at me to take it out of its misery and throw it away as soon and quick as possible. I thought to myself, “she’s not really going to make me use this, I can’t use this, it’s practically broken. If I get caught using this cruddy binder it’d practically be social suicide”.I was so self concerned with the way others would think about me, I politely asked my mom if she was able to get me a new binder so I wouldn’t have to deal with the problems of a used binder. I hadn’t fully explained my reasoning behind why having a used binder wouldn’t work for a third grader.

Being the nice, caring and loving mom she always is, later that same day she went to three different school supply stores just to get me a new binder that I didn’t exactly need since I had one that was more than sufficient already in the closet. Even to this day I still do this to my loving and caring parents, trying to work my way into and through a situation to where I can convince them on why I should have something that’s new instead of using what we already have and save their hard earned money to be able to afford more important aspects of life.

I finally realized that in the future when we’ve all grown and matured that no one  is going to ridicule me for the quality of what I was able to use to get me to where I am at today but at the end of the day was does matter is the way that I treat others, not only my loved ones and family members but also a random stranger off the streets whom I’ve never met before asking for a little bit of help. That what I truly realize is the meaning to our lives is not by what materialistic items I possessed but how I treated others that are less fortunate or even who may be more fortunate than me.

Now that I’ve started my Junior year in high school, I was in a great deal of panic, losing sight of what matters most once more and getting flustered towards my parents once more. I had all my school supplies, packed up in my backpack ready to go for school in four days. Got my labels on my binders; Personal Econ, Psychology, AP Stats, AP Bio, Pre-calc / trig, ELA 11. I had reorganized my pencil pouch to hold my different assortment of supplies such as my crayola colored pencils, one glue stick, a yellow and pink highlighter, a red and black ballpoint pen, and an eraser. I was never really a stickler on owning the newest and most expensive clothes, but I really wouldn’t care what my outfit looked like I would just pick out what seemed appealing to me at the time. When I began shuffling through my closet, I realized that all the clothes that I had in my closet were from two or three years ago. Almost as if I hadn’t learned anything from my past experience and realization in third grade, I tried to convince my mom that I needed new clothes and a few full outfits for school this year. Although she asked what is wrong with the clothes you had now, I continued to make up what was wrong with them so it would seem as more of an urgency to go and get clothes for me.

“Okay, we’ll leave in fifteen minutes. Be ready.” my mom said as she finished giving our dog Bailey her dinner.

As I laid back in bed waiting for my mom to be ready to leave I couldn’t help but feel that I should deserve an award for being able to use trickery into getting what I want. After all this lying I had been doing to get what I want I’m surprised that my nose hadn’t grown like Pinocchio. As I began thinking about what I had just done, a smirk came shining across my face and when I started to feel the muscles in my face start to tense up into a smirk I knew exactly what was happening and in that moment it hit me, I hadn’t applied anything that I took away from my experience in third grade unto now. I don’t need new clothes, I just wanted new clothes to look nice and have people notice my outfits. I hadn’t taken into consideration where all the money comes from that allows me to live such a privileged life that I’m able to live because of what my parents do day in and day out to support their family. I quickly wiped the smirk off my face and went downstairs to tell my mom that I don’t really need new clothes, the ones I have right now are fine. As I began to walk graciously lung back up the stairs to my room knowing that I was giving up an opportunity to have a few really nice new outfits for the school year to wear but instead I was being thoughtful and frugal with not my money but my parents money. As I was about to lay back in bed and conclude the day and get mentally prepared for another nine months of school, I couldn’t help but get a grin from what a good deed I had done and gave myself a pat on the back.

For me, to front up new outfits and use outfits that I’ve had for year after year after year was like a new mother giving up her brand new born baby, to be able to improve the way I treat others in this life because at the end of the day the things we think we need are just materialistic and hold no value to us once we leave this Earth but was does hold value and will remain in our legacy is our integrity, how humble and honorable we are to not just our family members and loved ones but also every other human that is on this Earth that we may come into contact with one way or another.

After this realization I had at the end of summer before my Junior year in high school I began to carried on these values and morals into every part of my day whether is as small of an act as acknowledging someone to as big of an act as determining and separating wants and needs. Thinking to myself, “treat others the way you would like to be treated”, I wouldn’t want my kids wasting my hard earned money and lose the value of hard earned money. I’ve set a goal for myself and I feel so far that it’s helped improve my lifestyle that for all my wants I pay most or all of what it costs and for my needs I work something out with my parents to try to help save them money on something they’re not going to be using.