My Legacy

I was presented with the question of what I want my legacy to be.

My first reaction was something lovey-dovey and good for the world, like a cure for cancer or the end to world hunger. But we’ve already got a cure for cancer in its beginning stages involving something known as microscopic heat rods. Ending world hunger is impossible from an economic standpoint because the ever-increasing population will always be competing from a limited number of food sources.

So what do I want to be remembered for? What’s my legacy?

I think I have it - equality rights. I want to be remembered as the one that procured rights of equality, whether you are black or white, straight or gay, religious or atheist, male or female. It’s a daunting task, I know. But I think I have something that will drive me: personal experience. I’ve been turned down for a job for being bisexual and I’ve known a teenager who was beaten up because he was black. I’m going to double major in college next year, maybe even go to law school after that. I know I don’t have the looks or natural charisma to be a spotlighted politician. Thus we enter law school. If I can’t be the politician that bends the rules, I’ll be the lawyer that creates them.

I wouldn’t do this for the best intentions of bettering the world. I’d do it for the mother of Matthew Shepherd, I’d do it for the sister of the teenager who was assaulted because of his race, and I’d do it for my future children and their generation so they can be whatever they want to be without being pressured by society into any one kind of person. To me, that’s what real freedom means. We see the armed forces fighting for freedom against the tyranny of foreign countries. I want to be one of the people that enforce freedom domestically. I want a gay couple to receive the same benefits as straight ones and I want schools in the ghetto, low-rent areas to get the same quality of education as a New York Prep School.

I know that I won’t accomplish all of these goals in my lifetime. But Martin Luther King Jr. never saw complete desegregation in his lifetime, either. I want to be remembered as the one who initiated it. I’ll be the woman who saw flaws in society and set in motion plans to fix them.

This will be my lifetime goal. This will be my legacy.