The Other Wes Moore Project

1.  Both of the Wes Moore’s grew up in similar situations. The author of this story is raised by his mom along with his two sisters.  The other Wes is raised by his mother along with his brother who goes back and forth between his mother and fathers house.  They both act like protectors and “man of the house,” being that one lost his father at an early age and the other never knew his.  They both had points in their lives where school was unimportant because of the pressure from their neighborhoods and the struggle to fit in. 

These two men grew up in poor neighborhoods and had to struggle with drugs and gangs living all around them.  They both had enough influential people in their lives to help to guide them, but their stubborn ways had other paths for them.  When I read this book it was a little confusing to distinguish between the two because of their names and similar situations.  You definitely have to re-read some areas to find out who we are focusing on. 

2.  For the author of the book, his turning point was when he was sent to military school.  He was failing his classes in school from what appeared to be boredom.  He takes advantage of the fact that he is the only boy and his mother’s threat of sending him to military school is just to scare him.  He crosses the line when he hits his sister in the face causing her lip to bleed.  He was taught at a young age that you never hit women and he pushed too far.  When he first gets to the military school he hates it and is mad at the world.  He tries to escape and eventually succumbs to his surroundings.  He grows to love it and appreciate the second chance he was given and is able to fulfill his dreams and make something of himself.  From military school he attends Oxford University and easily moves on through life with accomplishments he never thought he would have achieved. 

 The other Wes Moore had a lot more to struggle with.  He became a father very early on in life with two different women.  When he saw how bad off his second girlfriend was with her drug addiction, he realized that he couldn’t take it anymore.  He wanted out of the drug business and wanted to make something of himself.  He joins the job corps and realizes that even though he missed a lot of school he is able to catch up and get his GED.  He is able to pick a profession that he is good at and makes him happy.  He becomes skilled in carpentry and is inspired to build a miniature house for his daughter.  He unfortunately buckles under the pressure of trying to take care of his mom and his four kids and returns to his old habits.

3.  The author of the book started out well with both parents.  Even though he was very young when his father passed away, he learned very important lessons from him.  His mother knowing what it feels like to struggle wanted the best for her son.  She was abused by her first husband and knew that was not the way to live.  After the passing of the second husband she knows that the best way to raise her kids was with the help of her parents.  Wes grows up with strict rules highly enforced by his grandparents.  He is respectful and also attends a private school far from the neighborhood.  His mother wants the best for him, and after he falls behind she surprises him by sending him to military school.  He is surrounded by people throughout his life that want to help and to see him succeed.

The other Wes grows up with a mother who is struggling with doing the best she can.  She has two sons from two different fathers.  Wes feels at a young age that he is the man of the house and needs to protect his mom.  When he sees her crying, he refuses to leave without an answer.  His mother got pregnant at 16 but retained her goals of attending school and being the first to go to college.  Her mother passes away when her firstborn is young and her father is an alcoholic.  Her second son, Wes has a father who is an alcoholic too.  He visits his father’s mother despite his father never playing a part in his life.  His mother works all the time and his brother falls through the cracks and becomes involved in drug dealings.  With no positive male role model, Wes looks upon becoming just like his brother, Tony, which his mother and Tony fight against every day.  Unfortunately he becomes a father at a young age to four kids and relies on the drug business to pay for all his financial burdens.  He hits an all time low that sends him to life in prison.

4.  This book shows that human behavior is highly influenced by both nature and nurture.  In both cases nurture takes place with the mothers working hard to try and raise their kids the best they can.  They try to provide for them but from working so hard they miss some of the signs that show when the boys start falling down.  The nature part is the impact that the neighborhoods have on these kids.  The author tries to play it cool with the neighborhoods kids even though he goes to a better, fancier school then they do.  This causes him to slack off and get into minor indiscretions, such as the spray painting incident.  The other Wes falls even harder with his mom being gone all the time and drugs being easily accessible.  He feels like this is the best way to make money so he can keep up with the latest gear, just like his brother. 

There are similar patterns between these two boys.  They both start off as innocent bystanders in a harsh community.  The best they have is what their mothers can provide and the rest they need to figure out for themselves.  The first Wes panics the first time he gets in trouble with the police.  He cries and prays that his mother will never find out.  Military school helps him to become a stronger person, despite the issue he faces when the car tried to run him down and he is stuck in the face with something hard.  He learned that fighting back is not the answer.  The second Wes had the crap beat out of him by his brother who was doing the best he could to protect his brother and help him to not end up like him.  Wes never gives up on trying making money and unfortunately ends up with the same fate as his brother of life in prison for a crime gone wrong.

5.  The thing that I like about the book was the similarities between two strangers.  I have always found it fascinating when I meet a person with the same name as me, or born around the same time.  You can’t help but wonder what else could be in common aside from a name.  I like that the author was so intrigued by the fact that another man with his name could be so similar and yet so different, I like the fact that he reached out to this stranger to find out who the “Other Wes Moore” was.  He also tries to imagine what it would have been like if they were in each other’s shoes.  I have often wondered what it would be like to be someone else, to live in a different time, a different situation, to have a different family.  He almost gets to experience that feeling because of how much they have in common.

The only complaint about the book was that it got a little confusing differentiating between the two Wes’s.  Having the same name made it hard to keep track of who was who and who was doing what.  Other than that I really enjoyed reading this book.  It is sad how hard their lives were growing up, and it really makes you appreciate what you have in life.  It is also amazing how they both end up completely the opposite of each other.  I wonder if fate would have been the same if they actually knew each other growing up.  Would one have influenced the other?  Could they both have ended up the same?