Rick Bragg, Pulitzer Prize Winning Journalist, grew up in Northeastern, Alabama where poverty was common among almost everyone. In his book All Over but the Shoutin', Bragg tells us his story and how he overcame the life's misfortunes. Moreover, the book pays a tribute to his mother and her strength and commitment to her family. He writes with pride to tell us that his mother inspired him to overcome obstacles most could not overcome with such a background. Rick Bragg made it his ultimate goal to "get even with life" and give back to his mother by being able to provide for her just the way she always provided for him. The first step to fixing something is realizing the problem. Bragg did not realize he was poor until he was in his early teens. In the book, Bragg states, "A frat house at Jacksonville State University threw a party for the …show more content…
Bragg knew of this wish just by the way she would look longingly at the houses around town. In the book, Bragg states, "All her life, as a child, as a young woman, as an aging one dozing in her new teeth, she had lived in other people's houses." (151) Bragg felt the only way he could repay his mother for all the sorrow and pain that she had been through was to give her the one thing she had always wanted. He wanted to give her a house of her own. After months of house hunting, Bragg says, "She picked the house out herself, after months of riding the back roads of Calhoun County, because she thought it was pretty, because the hill always seemed to have a pretty good breeze on it, other reasons, some silly, some not." (310) This was the only way he felt he could "get even with life" and overcome what they both lived through their entire lives: poverty. His mother had finally gotten her well deserved happiness, and that was all it took for Bragg to allow himself to feel content with his place in