Below is the story I’ve been working on as a possible final for my capstone/senior project at Southern Oregon University.  I’m still trying to get a few more interviews in but here’s what I got.

Getting your life together is hard.  To start from the ground up is harder.  To do this at 22-years-old is probably the hardest.

Not too long ago, Patrick Middlebrooks was booked and in jail for a assualt four charge according to Medford’s version of Mugshots.com on April 19th, 2011.

“If I had $25 to take the picture down, I’ll probably do it,” he mention, “It’s just that, I don’t have $25 at the moment.”

Years ago, Middlebrooks had a music scholarship to go to Washington State, but opt’d out of it because of money reasons.

“I wanted to go, don’t get me wrong,” he started, “but they were talking money, money, money and I didn’t have it.”

He’s been taking Community College classes off and on since then.

His girlfriend goes to the Rogue Community College/Southern Oregon University building over in Medford.  She’s trying to get her general education requirments out of the way before transferring to a university.  Middlebrooks was talking to her a little bit ago.

“What time do you get done?  4?” he started, “You want me to meed up with you?  Ok.  I’ll be over there in a few.”

Middlebrooks got back into the Medford Gospel for the second time on Thursday.

“I just got signed back into this place,” he said, “I got 10 days to get a job.”

He never liked the place.  Too many rules he mentioned once.  Curfew at nine.  No food or drinks outside of the cafeteria.  Only watch TV when they say you can.  So on and so forth.

Ten days though.  To get a job in a county that has an unemployment rate of 12.7% according to Google’s public data page.

Middlebrooks couldn’t believe how hard it is finding a job.  He’s tried fast-food places and restaurants even.  Too many people applying here, they don’t want someone with tattoos there.  No luck.

“I’m gonna keep trying,” he said, “I gotta get outta this place and get my life straight.”