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Bridges was born in 1950 to middle-class parents struggling to survive in South Los Angeles and Compton, black communities with reputations for gang crime and violence. Bridges’ southern-born father and midwestern-born mother eventually secured jobs as assemblers for Northrup Aviation after moving to sunny California. The author.’s mother worked hard to keep him on the straight and narrow after his older sisters succumbed to the temptations of youth, but she was plagued by ill health, often leaving the boy in his father’s care. When Bridges’ father opened a record shop, he took a shortcut to financial freedom by creating a gambling den in the back storage room. The environment fascinated the young man, and, ironically, he first observed streetwise behavior there.
When he was just six years old, Bridges and a friend were caught shoplifting, his first brush with the law. Thus began a string of misbehaviors, a familiar relationship with the California Division of Juvenile Justice, and later, some hard time with the US Bureau of Prisons. Bridges’ checkered life took a good turn when he entered an inmate release program sponsored by the University of California at Santa Barbara, where he earned a degree in sociology. At the request of his sociology professor, Bridges began to write his memoir, a project forty-five years in the making.
This entertaining narrative is a fast, easy read due to Bridges’ accomplished writing ability and his focus on a page-turning flow of events. Readers will cheer Bridges on despite his criminal tendencies because he desires so clearly the dreams that American society encourages—a prosperous life complete with fast cars and well-dressed, beautiful people. Bridges’ personable yet nearly tragic tale flips when he finds solace in religion and nurtures his desire to resume his education, a conclusion proving youthful indiscretion can be transformed into a life well-lived.
RECOMMENDED by the US Review