When most people think of reddish-orange shag carpet, they associate it with an old, outdated hotel or motel building. I, on the other hand, associate it with memories, family, love, trust, home, and stability. My father has lived in the same apartment in Oakland, California, for more than 20 years. The place is considerably old and is now the only unit in the building that has yet to be remodeled. It has the same plumbing; same paint; same appliances; and the same old, dusty burnt orange carpet.
Rickey McLane
The building has changed owners twice. The original landlord, Mr. Davis, passed away; his nephew eventually sold it, and it was later sold again. Neighbors have moved in and out, and Oakland has changed around it. Yet my father is still there. When I was younger, I sometimes wondered why my friends lived in houses with garages, backyards, and extra bedrooms. Yet we lived in a small two-bedroom apartment. As a child, I did not understand why we could not have more. However, as an adult, I now understand that I was looking at one of my father’s greatest accomplishments.
Before Pleitner Avenue, “home” changed often. I remember many nights sleeping beside my father in our metallic blue 1983 Honda Civic because we could not afford a place to stay. I remember the mosquito-ridden shed behind my great-uncle’s house, where he allowed us to stay for a couple of months while my father got back on his feet. I remember the countless motels, hotels, and shelters. One summer, a woman named Miss Mary-Anne rented us a room in her home on Hanover Street. I slept in that tiny spare bedroom while my father slept in our car in the garage.
My strongest memory from that summer is watching episode after episode of SpongeBob SquarePants. That is the strange innocence of childhood. I knew we did not have our own home, but I did not understand what that meant. I was with my dad. We had a television to watch and had somewhere to sleep. I did not see the calculations taking place in his head, and I did not understand that while I watched cartoons, he was working odd jobs morning, evening, and night, trying to save enough money for us to move. Eventually, he did.
Just before I turned 11, Mr. Davis took a chance on a single father and his son. Mr. Davis lowered the deposit by 50% and allowed us to move into a one-bedroom apartment in his complex. About a year later, we moved from the one-bedroom unit into a second-floor, two-bedroom corner apartment in the neighboring building. That old apartment overlooking the street has been our home ever since.
My father, Rickey McLane Sr., was 38 when he had me, his only biological son and namesake. After my birth, he realized that raising children required more than finding enough money for today. He secured a job with the Oakland Housing Authority, where he would work for more than 20 years, because he wanted what inconsistent jobs could not guarantee: medical insurance, dental insurance, healthy food, quality clothes, and a permanent roof over our heads.
Interestingly, my father never sat me down at the kitchen table and taught me about financial literacy. He taught it by living. I watched him budget finances, save money, pay bills on time, avoid unnecessary purchases, and slowly learn how to manage credit and debt. There was no investment portfolio or property to pass down to me. What he was building was less visible, and I would eventually come to understand its value.
More importantly, it never belonged only to us. Whenever my sisters have struggled, encountered hardships, or just needed somewhere to stay, my father’s door was always open. When life knocked my mother down, that same door opened for her. Whenever I returned home and needed somewhere to lay my head, my room was still there. That old, unremodeled apartment became our family’s safety net. For a family that has often lived close to the financial edge, there has always been one address where everyone knew they could return.
It took adulthood for me to understand that what my father accomplished financially was much greater than I gave him credit for as a child. It also made me ask what I could build from the foundation he gave me. It led me to open a savings account and 401(k), build a budget spreadsheet, pay closer attention to my monthly statements and expenses, and start cooking at home more often to save money. None of these decisions are dramatic, but that may be precisely the point. I watched my father create stability through thousands of ordinary decisions made consistently, and now I am learning to do the same.
Medical school has raised the stakes for me. I am now financing all of my medical education through loans while pursuing a career that requires years of training before reaching its full earning potential. I know that becoming a physician may eventually provide me with an income my father never had, but I also know that a large income does not guarantee financial security. That is why financial literacy has become personal to me. As I progress through medicine, I want to remember that the goal of earning more is not necessarily to spend more. For me, it is the opportunity to turn the stability my father created into something that can last beyond either of us.
When I walk through the apartment door now, I no longer compare it with the houses in which my friends grew up. I see the nights in the blue Honda that came before it. I see the garage where my father slept so I could have Miss Mary-Anne’s spare room. I see more than 20 years of rent paid on time, meals cooked, clothes washed, bills handled, and a father quietly making sure his son never had to wonder where he would sleep again.
For most of my life, that apartment represented what my father was able to provide. Today, it represents the foundation I hope to build upon. Medicine is part of that future, and becoming financially responsible enough to handle the opportunities medicine may provide is another. My father never owned a big house, multiple cars, or many of the things I once associated with success. Instead, he gave me a stable place from which I could build a life, and that stability helped carry me from sleeping in a blue Honda Civic to medical school.
My father has spent more than 20 years making sure I always had a home where I could return. While he is still here to enjoy it, I hope that one day I can hand my best friend the keys to a home of his own, with the carpet of his choice.