When I was five years old, I was a blond-haired, blue-eyed, bright and cheery kid. Always enjoying myself, except if I scraped my knee. I never knew about the awful things in life. Didn't know what a gun was, except for the clear blue one with water inside. Didn't know what a drug was until I started taking Flintstones vitamins. The only difference that I found with blacks and whites was color. Kids just thought of kids of a different color as another kid to play kickball with. How could I know that all those things cause so much trouble. All I ever watched was Sesame Street and they never told you about the bad stuff; rather they told you how to say four in Spanish and the letter of the day.

Well I now know that not everyone leads the same life as I do. I know that there are many homeless families with young children. A five-year-old kid can be out on the street playing ball and ten feet away there may be people dealing drugs. Other children live in places with gangs and can't walk down a street without being afraid of something terrible happening to them. Things have gotten so much worse in the last eight years. The drug problem has gotten worse and the murder rate has increased also. Young children must be taught and made aware of the awful things in life. If these children are being brought up naive and ignorant then what will happen when they are running the country, will it be corrupt? The children are the future. We have to make sure they are well-educated and conscious of the world around them.n