SAT作文素材39:Rags to Riches
Chris Gardner tells 20/20 how he worked to move himself from a life of homelessness to a successful life as a businessman.
Gardner is the head of his own brokerage firm and lives in a Chicago Townhouse--one of his three homes with a collection of tailored suits, designer shoes, and Miles Davis albums.
His path to this extraordinary success took a series of extraordinary turns. Just 20 years ago, Gardner was homeless and living, on occasion, in a bathroom at a Bay Area Rapid Transit station in Oakland, Calif.
Gardner was raised by his mother, a schoolteacher. He says he never knew his father while he was growing up. But his mother had a way of keeping him grounded when he dreamed of things like being a jazz trumpeter.
Mothers have a way of saying things, Gardner said, She explained to me, Son, theres only one Miles Davis and he got that job. So you have to do something else. But what that something else was, I did not know.
Gardner credits his uncles with providing the male influence he needed. Many of them were military veterans. So, straight out of high school, he enlisted in the Navy for four years. He says it gave him a sense of what was possible.
A Red Ferrari and a Turning Point
After the military, Gardner took a job as a medical supply salesman. Then, he says, he reached another turning point in his life. In a parking lot, he met a man driving a red Ferrari. He was looking for a parking space. And I said, You can have mine. But I gotta ask you two questions. The two questions were: What do you do? And how do you do that? Turns out this guy was a stockbroker and he was making $80,000 a month.
Gardner began knocking on doors, applying for training programs at brokerages, even though it meant he would have to live on next to nothing while he learned. When he finally was accepted into a program, he left his job in medical sales. But his plans collapsed as suddenly as they had materialized. The man who offered him the training slot was fired, and Gardner had no job to go back to.
Things got worse. He was hauled off to jail for $1,200 in parking violations that he couldnt pay. His wife left him. Then she asked him to care for their young son without her. Despite his lack of resources, Gardner said, I made up my mind as a young kid that when I had children, my children were gonna know who their father was. Although a broker finally helped him enter a training program, Gardner wound up with no place to live. He was collecting a meager stipend as a brokerage trainee, and, like many working poor in America, he had a job but couldnt make ends meet.
The Kindness of Strangers
When he could afford it, he stayed with his son, Chris Jr., in cheap motels. When they returned home at night, Gardner says, he received help from some unexpected sources. The ladies of the evening were beginning their shift. And they would always see myself, this baby and the stroller.
So they started giving him $5 bills. Without their help, Gardner said, there would have been nights when he couldnt have fed his son. The Rev. Cecil Williams, founder of Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco, remembers the first time he saw Gardner, who had gone to the church with his son to stand in a meal line. He said, I wondered, What in the world is a man doing with a baby?
Even to Williams, it was an unusual sight. The Urban Institute estimates that children make up 25 percent of the nations homeless population, but most are living with a single mother,not the father.
6月英语四级考试阅读七大技巧
名师推荐英语六级写作满分表达句型
从心理角度提高四六级听力成绩
名师分析英语四级翻译主要考点
6月英语四六级听力备考的系统策略
英语六级考试阅读备考常见的问题
6月英语六级作文试题解析
考前十五天完形填空拿分必备技巧
英语四六级考前三十天听力冲刺方法全指导
英语四级写作难点分析及应对策略
英语四六级听力训练的三原则
名师点评6月四级英语整体难度略降
通过英语四级听力的两大妙招
点评英语四级真题
12月英语六级冲刺考前一周复习要点提示
英语四六级考试指导穿越四六级翻译
6月英语四六级考前温馨提示
英语四六级考前三十天常遇困惑全解密
6月四六级考场上如何充分利用考试时间
6月英语四级考试完型填空题做题技巧
名师支招12月英语四级最后冲刺全攻略
大学英语四级考试必过宝典
英语四六级考前作文辅导
英语六级考试阅读真题的英语典故探析
如何炼成英语四六级应试指导作文达人
四六级听力不给力的原因和解决办法
写好英语句子的方法
教大家英语口语学习法思维篇上
四级备考攻略之快速阅读篇
6月英语四级真题难度不大考生更多机会
不限 |
英语教案 |
英语课件 |
英语试题 |
不限 |
不限 |
上册 |
下册 |
不限 |