I woke up in a dream, a daze, an image of what could be true but wasn\'t. The perfect life! Sunset beach with everything you could ever dream of. It all seemed so good until I hit reality.

I woke up to see an image of me and what everybody once said I would become. A good for nothing hoodrat that ain\'t worth no more then the chains and cell she got locked up in.

Waking up to see this image of me wasn\'t a surprise, which made me even more uncomfortable. You see I never thought about growing up to be more like mommy cuz mommy never seemed that interesting and daddy never worked hard enough for me.

In poverty by the age of three, shattered hope and lost my dreams before I even knew what they mean. Which was by the age of thirteen.

You see I grew up in the streets so it wasn\'t hard for me to lose my dreams. Learned that snitches get stitches and, though it wasn\'t what it seemed, I had to take one for the team which explains why I never felt the need to tell the officers it wasn\'t my weed!

Slammed chest against police doors making it hard for me to breathe but not impossible to think so i thought about consequence.

I couldn\'t believe it! For the first time in my life I thought. Mommy\'s wise words ECHOED, ECHoed, echoed, in my mind. \"Friends don\'t let friends ruin their life Jackie.\" Click, click, click BOOM!

Cold metal around my wrists making it hard for me to fully understand what was happening. Slam doors, engine starts, vehicle moves. Left turn down Grand up to Central. I was placed in a cell 5ft. by 5ft. This is what the street did for me! Rewarding huh? 24 hrs. felt like weeks and I never felt so alone.

You see when you\'re locked up for a while you tend to think alot. The same question kept popping up in my mind and I\'m hoping the answer isn\'t hard to find cuz to this lost soul it could be the map of my life.

The question was where will I be in the next 5 years. 5 years, 60 months, 240 weeks, 1,680 days in each creating pathways to a better future, that is, if i make the right decisions.

June 6, 2006 was the day I had my dance with the devil and I promised myself I\'d never do it again!