The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates

Chapter 7 begins with Moore in military training and recounts the stress and fear he felt prior to making his first jump as a paratrooper.

During high school, Moore was romanced by several colleges, “but eventually, all of these treats started to feel meaningless” (130). To really solidify his chances at a good postsecondary education, he realized he had to rely on his academic performance to impress schools. His basketball skills were good but not easy or natural. However, his passion for reading blossomed, and his intellectual pursuits were inspired by Colin Powell’s My American Journey. It made him “harmonize [his] understanding of America’s history and [his] aspirations to serve her in uniform” (131). Moore writes, “Colin Powell […] wanted what I wanted: A fair shot. A place to develop himself. A code that would instill discipline, restrain passion, and order his steps. A way to change the world without first unleashing the whirlwind” (132).

The author then reflects on the important men who taught him valuable lessons at Valley Forge. This sort of passion for life and duty made his decision clear: “[he] wanted to lead soldiers” (133). This led to that “most memorable plane ride of [his] life” (134). Before jumping out of the plane, Moore was reminded to “trust your equipment, trust your training, and trust your God” (135). After jumping, he finally opened his eyes and “felt a cocktail of beautiful emotions […] peace, love, and appreciation. […] My equipment was functional, my training was sound, my faith confirmed” (136-37). He landed safely with his eyes fixed on the horizon.

The focus shifts back to Wes, who was also poised to take a leap into a new life. The segment begins with Wes trying to revive Cheryl (the mother of his third and fourth children) from a heroin high. Wes reflects on the signs he noticed over time that Cheryl was an addict. He saw this sort of thing every day because it was his job, but the “sight of her coming off her high […] disgusted” him (138). It was time for a change because “his tolerance of his own hypocrisy was wearing thin” (138).

Wes walked to the house of his friend Levy, who had quit the hustling ring a few months before. Wes was seeking help and encouragement because he finally wanted to “do something different with [his] life” (138). After clarifying that it would be very difficult and require discipline, Levy told him about Job Corps. Wes was too old to go back to high school, and this program was designed to help disadvantaged young adults. Levy himself was a high school dropout; he hoped to come out of the Job Corps with a GED. The pay was lower than hustling on the streets, but “the work was steady and honest, and he would have more time to give his family without injury, death, or incarceration looming” (139).

Two weeks after his conversation with Levy, Wes left for Job Corps Centre in Laurel, Maryland. He figured that if “he was willing to put in the work, he would leave the program a different person” (141). Wes was impressed with the facilities, which were “exactly what [he] imagined a college campus would look like” (141).

Participants were initially tested to determine their level placement for GED training. While Levy would have to go through more training, Wes “finished near the top of his class. He completed the course work and received his GED a month later. He was already reading at the level of a sophomore in college” (142). This made Wes “[think] differently about his life” (142), and others in the community came to him for advice and friendship. He was becoming a leader.

Wes chose carpentry for his job training. When finally given the opportunity to build something, he thought about his daughter and wanted to build “a house big enough […] to protect her” (142). The house came to represent Wes’s purpose in pursuing this training for all these months, which “had been the most important and enjoyable in Wes’s life. He’d learned skills, gained confidence, and finally felt his life could go in a different direction” (143-44). After finishing with Job Corps, Wes moved from being a landscaper to a home “rehabber” to a food preparer. His work was inconsistent and didn’t pay more than $9 an hour. Although he usually avoided the streets of Baltimore because they represented his former life, one evening on his way home from work he revisited them to pick up a package and realized “how little the game had changed” (144).

This sense of stagnation affected his life as well:

Wes had felt his problems floating off in the soft country air of Laurel. A year after graduating, he realized they had not disappeared—they’d simply returned to Baltimore, waiting for him to come back. In his absence, they’d compounded (145).

The chapter ends with Wes cooking cocaine in his kitchen.