“Calm down!” My mother said as she grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him like she did to us kids when we were young. “Aubrey come help me with this troublemaker”, she said gesturing towards me. “Why are you running around screaming that we’re doomed?” You are going to scare everyone. Tell me what is going on”, she fiercely chided him.
    “Well, I drove Mr. Dunbuggy to the farm down the road today. He had me drive him there so he could see The Machine they had just got down there. You should see The Machine looming over the rows of cotton as tall as two men and as wide as three! It’s like a car with three wheels and something resembling a small shack on top with tubes all over looking like it could pluck you off the ground chew you up! Anyway Mr. Dunbuggy loved The Machine and when he gets enough money, he going to buy one and he won’t be needing all you workers anymore!”
“Hush now and don’t go speaking about your little fantasies. You are scaring the others, now run along and don’t come back unless you have something worthwhile to say.” She scolded him.
“Ma what if he’s right. What’ll happen to us if The Machine comes?” I asked frightfully.
“Don’t you worry girl. That boy if full of crazy ideas. His imagination is too wild,” she said shaking her head. Well a month went by and there was no sign of The Machine so things went back to normal and it became another fairytale people joked about and made stories about. I woke up to screams of bloody murder and shouts. When I looked up I could see my mother and father carrying things out of the shack we shared with two other families. I looked over at my siblings, Whitney and Marcus who were yelling
“Stop it, stop it, and please don’t make us move!” They stood there hunched over with tears streaming down their faces and they looked as if someone had shot them straight in the gut. I jumped out of bed and ran over to them as a string of words flowed from my mouth and I bombarded them with questions.
“What is happening? Did somebody die? I don't understand. Tell me what is going on!” My siblings sat down and pulled me down with them.
“Remember how that boy told us about the machines down the road?”
“Yes, but what does this have to do with them? “I asked. She sighed heavily and then spoke.
“Well Mr. Dunbuggy thought they were an amazing invention and he has finally saved up enough money to buy three of them. Look outside.” I looked outside to see some car-like things coming in with blades that did look like they could chew you in two. There was a big area on the back, almost like a small boxy room with netting to catch the cotton that big blades and tubes sucked in. Overall it was frightening and did not look safe to be around.
“So what does that mean? How does that affect us?” I said
“Well, Dunbuggy doesn’t need us anymore there’s no need to have workers when he has machines. He will be keeping some of the big, strong people to help work the machines, but everyone else has a day to get off the farm.”
“We have nowhere to go through!” I said “What will become of us, what are we going to do?” At that moment the same boy who had told us about the machines ran into the house.
“I told you they were going to come and here they are.” He boasted
“How can you be boastful right now? You can’t live here anymore because of them!” I shrieked at him.
“Well my mama’s got some friends a few miles away living’ at some welfare camp and her friend got us a nice little place there. If you want, I will ask if there’s room for you guys.” These welfare homes would eventually be called “the projects”. Interesting how they think we are a “project”. The government really does love their projects.
“Alright I’ll go ask but if you can get in I won't be able to tell you today so you’ll have to find a place to spend the night.” Mama went to Mr. Dunbuggy and begged for him to let us stay one night but he was firm on his word that we had to be cleared out by nightfall. Needless to say we spent the night in the bushes on the side of the road. All night I didn't sleep a wink due to the shrieks of owls and the howls of coyotes just waiting to eat my family for a midnight snack. We layed there using pillow cases we had foraged with our clothes stuffed in them as pillows. That was one of the worst nights of my life and I will never forget it. I finally fell asleep at the crack of dawn only to be woken up thirty minutes late by a pesky raccoon looking for food that we didn’t have. The boy from the day before ran towards us yelling that he had found a place for us to share with another couple. It was at the welfare camp down the road and I don’t think anything ever looked so beautiful to me in my entire life. The rising sun lit up the houses with an orange glow. As soon as we got inside the house I flopped down on the first steel bed I saw it was steel with a thin straw mattress and a thin blanket on it. Before I had time to look around the room, I had fallen into a deep sleep that I needed greatly. I woke up to the sound of my stomach growling my mother heard and spoke up.
“They won’t be feeding us honey we don’t work for these people. Your Pa and I have to go find jobs, but for the time being we will get food stamps that will allow us to buy small amounts of food until we get back on our feet again.” My parents, siblings and I went out every single day to try and find work, but the job market was sparse due to the fact that The Machine had taken over the farms of Mississippi and the jobs not on a farm were taken too. So many jobs that we tried to get we were unable to get because no one in my family had an education. My dream was to get and education, learn to read, and become a teacher. I hoped my family would get jobs and we could get enough money to support ourselves so I could go to school and not have to worry about making money. I have always loved to learn and ever since I was young I would pester the other workers for stories and facts about the world.  One warm day in May, I sat on the front steps of the house and looked around at the people who had been displaced by The Machines. So many were here, but I had heard of some who had not been so lucky and were homeless living like we had the night after The Machine came. As I looked around I saw hundreds of scraggly, thin people going to find jobs or crying after being rejected. All this just because of one invention, one machine, one technological advance. By itself The Machine had taken the jobs and homes of so many uneducated, honest workers. A question suddenly came to my mind, why would someone create something that could ruin so many lives. We did good work and the fields were always cleared earlier than other farms. I was positive our work could be better than any machine I thought as I spat in the dirt. I looked up to see my mother walking towards me with a spring in her step.
            “Hi mama. Why do you look so happy? “I questioned curiously
“The Ferguson’s maid died, which isn’t exactly good news, but they offered me her job.”
             “That’s amazing!” I shrieked jumping up and giving my mother a bone-crushing hug.
“Well I’m going to tell your siblings and father, I’m just so happy!” She said as she jogged off. My ma was such a hard worker and she deserved this job. Living in welfare was my worst nightmare, I just wanted to get out and live like a human and get an education. My mom spent eight years working as a maid, my dad got a job as a cook down the street from my mother's work, my siblings and I got jobs carrying and stocking food at the local grocery store. My mother worked as a maid until it became popular for women to do their own housework due to more technological innovations, needless to say both my parents lost their jobs. I was able to get an education and become a teacher and take care of my parents, my siblings continued to work at the grocery store for a small salary and never got an education even though I warned them that something bad could happen again. I have learned you can never take anything for granted because in the end, you never know what machine will take your job.