I am proud to be a strong Black woman. It's taken me years to fully accept where I come from and how I was raised. In fact, I'm still settling into the total person I've grown into.
My mother moved our family all around Los Angeles. We were never homeless, however, we lived in predominantly, all Black and Mexican neighborhoods where we witnessed not only homelessness, but prostitution, heavy gang activity, and all sorts of misfortune. In these same neighborhoods, is where we also observed several miracles and gained roots of incomparable strength to live/thrive among "
the survival of the fittest."
To be blunt about "it" I was raised in the ghetto.
I had the best childhood outside of my home. My childhood friends also agree that we experienced some of our best memories growing up in the ghetto or what's commonly now referred to as, the hood. Now, when I was a little girl growing up in these highly disadvantaged neighborhoods, I didn't know there was an identifier-label placed upon our communities by outsiders and insiders who moved out, then chose to forget where they originally came from.
Not all, but many insiders are ashamed of their upbringing and sugar-coat or flat-out lie about how/where they were raised. Outsiders usually speak from ignorance and fear when making derogatory statements about Black people from the hood or the hood, itself.
I had an insider experience during my middle-school years. For the second half of my 7th grade year, my mother got a permit to transfer from the school district because she worked at the Veteran's Administration Memorial Center (VAMC) in West Los Angeles, which enabled my way out of the hood (for at least 8 hours during the week), while I was fighting often and being threatened daily at my home school. My brother experienced something similar during his middle-school years and when my mother didn't take action; he did, by joining a gang in order to have a support group when he was being threatened and jumped on by other gang members. I may have followed suit had I been forced to remain in my home school without any other options.
Thank GOD for His Holy intervention!!!
The new school was so different from my home school. The campus was clean. It was a diverse group of students. Here, is where I first remember interacting with kids whom were born in several different countries and spoke various languages. The competition between our egos was more about intellect than appearance.
Truth be told, I probably appeared like I lived in and came from the hood based upon my demeanor. I recall feeling embarrassed sometimes about where I lived versus my classmates. Some of my friends rode the school bus home to their neighborhoods on the westside. Back then, I so badly wanted to be a "westside-girl." A westside Black girl. Why?
Well, most of them were bourgeoisie. They lived in cleaner neighborhoods and had bigger homes with their own bedrooms; some had their own bathrooms. Their parents were married or divorced and many had relationships with their fathers. They were involved in extracurricular/social activities outside of school and home. I thought they had "it" made and "that" caused me to experience some moments of envy.
Self-criticism and unfair comparisons about my family and others began to creep into my thoughts.
I wasn't totally honest about where I really came from with everyone who asked. Shamefully, I'm able to say now, I behaved like the insider who wished she could rewrite her history. "It" is more than satisfying accepting all that contributes towards who I am right now, today.
Gladly, I remember me.
America probably wishes too, that she could go back in time and approach uniting the states and we, as a people, differently.
...To be continued on Day 3.
