I have a friend. She reads some of the stuff I write and I read some of hers. As such, I come to know a little about her. She grew up in a poor Texas border town with a brother, a sister, a Mexican father and a white mother. Her dad was a sonofabitch, a drunk, things were rough, there was abuse and a mighty struggle to make ends meet. My friend has succeeded in spite of this, but she wears those hard times and those hardships like a medal. It colors who she is, how she sees things. She keeps those memories within easy reach, using them some days as motivation, other days as an excuse. One day not too long ago, she said to me in an innocent observation, “You had an idyllic childhood didn’t you?” It caught me by surprise. What I always considered normal the world often views as privileged. Her question had a note of irony as if she felt a little bad for me. The world spins in an odd way in 2018. Growing up on “tough street” comes with some sort of badge of honor, but growing up with successful stability somehow lacks street cred and is unworthy. In the end, her off-the-cuff inquiry made me feel sheepish as if in the process of confirming this fact I should also probably offer an apology … Ya I had a wonderful childhood, idyllic is an appropriate descriptor, and I couldn’t be more sorry about being born into a stable family with a gainfully employed father and for having an easy life. If it’s any consolation, I try pretty consistently to fuck it all up.

I’ve had every advantage, every possible fortuitous twist of fate. I was born white. I was born too late for one war and too early for another. My parents stayed married. My dad applied himself. My mom saw motherhood as an occupation. I had enough brothers and sisters to provide strength in numbers, a family unit that provided insulation and possibilities. I knew my grandparents and they stayed married. I was assigned a religion that remains popular. Everyone I knew seemed to be okay with the gender in their pants. I was sent to college, it was paid for. I was given ridiculous gifts at Christmastime, got money when I asked for it, people always remembered my birthday, I got vaccinated. All these things – every single one of them – happened by utter chance, total luck. It all happened automatically solely because of the circumstances I was born into.

I’m not really sure what it’s supposed to be about. What’s the bigger accomplishment in life: getting a hit and then moving all the way to third base or being placed on first base because your dad paid off the umpire and then coming all the way around to score a run?

My friend, bless her heart, felt a twinge of pity for me because I spent a childhood in Candyland, maybe feeling that I would have turned out better, more well rounded and more thankful had I grown up somewhere with a dirt floor. She’s not the first person to cast a sideways glance, to think me the beneficiary of advantages gained unfairly. Achievement of the American dream used to be admired, now chasing it and attaining it is somehow portrayed as inauthentic and disingenuous. My dad would be the first to call bullshit, and I’ll stand with him. Take any advantage that you can get and pass it on to the family; always try to give your kin a leg up.

We don’t get to pick where we start. But if we did, you can be damn sure I would pick the place with the shiny Schwinn bikes and epic Christmas mornings. The place where there was a dad willing to gamble money on my success, a mom at home who could help button the snap on my play clothes and a wooden cabinet with a sliding metal drawer that contained seventeen different kinds of cookies.

Apologize? Fuck that.