Tired of Being Afraid

Today I am tired, almost too tired to write. Exhausted from trying. Trying to understand. Trying not to hate my circumstances. Trying not to hate my neighbors. Trying trying trying. It is draining to put on a positive face in a world of hatred. I am tired so very tired. I've asked myself "what am I doing here?", "how has this become my life?". Do you wonder; how did I arrive here? To make a long story (which I promise to tell eventually) very short, I fell in love with a beautiful kind compassionate man, we got pregnant and had to choose between 2 apartments; mine in Queens or his here in East Flatbush Brooklyn. After much deliberation we decided that Brooklyn afforded us the luxury of my staying home with our son for as long as possible. Now it seems impossible. I do not think I can stay here much longer and yet I have no other choice. At 43 years old and after a long hard journey I have found the love of my life and yet you don't want me here. You make it clear, every day, each and every day, that I am not welcome in his neighborhood.
At first, I thought I was here to learn acceptance; to be accepted and to accept difference. I do not believe this now, there is no acceptance of difference here. There is no tolerance. Then I thought that maybe I was here to make a difference. I tutored a young boy for free and I believed that this was the answer: I was here to help change things. I planned and thought, I prayed and plotted. I came up with the skeletal plans for a "Trickle Down Mentoring Program"- starting with local high school students and community leaders we could do some sort of Book/Movie Club, carefully choosing books and movies with a message, the high school students could then meet with and mentor middle school students, who in turn could visit the elementary school students and read and do art projects with them. This program would not only show each participating individual their value in their own world, but their value as productive members of society. This program would offer hope to children and young adults who have very little positive experience and very little hope in their lives. This program would CHANGE THE WORLD. I apparently was too hard on the student I was tutoring "forcing" him to work at the level his teacher expected of him. Unlike the student's mother, I refused to do the work for this boy, I worked closely with him urging him to think, offering him options to choose from and encouraging his creativity. I met with him between 3 & 5 days a week in my home. I gave him snacks. I talked to him not only about his work but about his world and dreams. I listened to him as he cried about the injustices he felt he suffered at the hands of his father. I listened to him dream of becoming a professional football player. I introduced him to my visiting 20 year old son who took the boy outside and tossed the football around with him, but ended the game when the football landed in a pile of dog shit: commonly left on the sidewalks and pavement in our area. After the homework was done, the boy would stay at first watching me prepare dinner and eventually helping (at his request); tasting vegetarian fare and learning basic culinary skills. He would leave only when his mother would finally call or when I would tell him our visit must end. And then, after a session of challenging work, he never returned.
At first I was devastated. Now I understand. I cannot change anything here. I can only live kindly. I can only live clean. I can only live my life. The quality of life here may be unacceptable in my heart, but it is the level the people that live here have chosen to accept.
Walk with me to the playground. Come with me, I want you to see what I see. First, we awaken, in our bright sunny clean studio apartment. In our comfy bed. What awakens us is the beautiful sound of a prattling 1 year old. His father is Tobogonian and I am American, but today he sounds Chinese, there is a lilt to his "language" that is melodic and choppy, firm and monotone. I can feel his tiny brown hand on my back and in my hair. I open my eyes to his morning "drunkenness" he is awake enough to "talk" but his eyes are still heavy with sleep. I do not want to get up today. I do not want to face this world. I am tired. I am laden with trying to find hope. But I have no choice.
So we dress and we load up the stroller. Remember, breathe and change your posture before we walk out into the hall. Remember: be tough. Only today I forget. My guard is down. I cannot put my shoulders back today. I cannot be angry. I cannot.
Off we go, watch out for the dead cockroach to the left of the door, it is dead but large and will make an intensely gross mess if it is stepped upon. Let's go down in the freshly mopped elevator that now smells of a mixture of old pee and orange cleanser. Remember, don't touch the walls. Can you hear the delight of the children in the daycare on the 1st floor? Stop & listen for a moment> it is a wonderful sound to carry around for the rest of the day. Please hold the first security door as we head outside, my stroller is cumbersome and hard to steer. It is a pleasure to have you with me.
Once we are outside I need a minute to focus and to put a hat on the baby's head, it is bright out here today. As we walk out of the gated area look at your surroundings; notice but don't be obvious, can you smell the reefer? That is coming from the 3 men on the bench to your left, the guys with the do-rags and the sagging jeans, the young men with the impeccably matched tee-shirt/sneaker/hat ensembles.
As we pass through the fenced area, look across the street into the yard of the playground we never visit. Notice the people. What do you see? There are men everywhere we look. Getting high on the benches near our apartment. Playing basketball in the park. Sitting in the playground. Don't watch too closely. You won't like what you see. Step around the trash and the spit, if you need to close your eyes and pretend the spit is slug slime, we do that sometimes and then, its not so bad. Here we take a left onto Foster Avenue. As we travel to the playground on 40Th Street things change. There are garbage bags randomly placed on fence posts by proud homeowners tired of cleaning up after ignorant passersby. The large apartment buildings fade and single family houses appear. Look closely. The first floor windows of these homes are covered with wrought iron bars and intricate works of iron. At 37Th & Foster you'll see the house that burned in a fire last summer. You cannot miss it: it is a side-by-side an eerie Siamese twin, one side is perfect and the other is marred, ruined, covered in charred siding, peeling, moulting, snake-like, except something is wrong. This house has been vacant for over a year. Ruined for over a year. Burnt unidentifiable objects sit, like unwanted orphans, on the front lawn and nothing changes. Not in this house, not in this neighborhood.
Fuck this. I'm tired of writing. Tired of reaching out and trying to make you understand. Trying to make a difference because the fact of the matter, THE FUCKING TRUTH OF THE MATTER IS THAT THE PEOPLE I NEED TO reach will never read this. I don't want to make this a nice story for your enjoyment; I want to tell you the truth.
As we walk away from the projects you are fooled, smoke & mirrors baby, that the area is getting better, but pay attention the improvements are superficial. As are the people that inhabit this bizarre world I've entered; nice cars nice clothes, shit attitude zero tolerance. As we round the corner to the football sized park/playground pay close attention to the visitors here. Picnic benches line the perimeter of the park. An older Indian gentleman sits at the first bench to our right, reading the paper he nods and says "hello". The 2ND bench is empty of a patron but covered in burn marks and graffiti and gum and gook. A "dredded" black man, about our age wearing jeans, a tee-shirt and work boots sits as if defeated on the next bench; he is either very sad or very stoned. His eyes are blood shot and his head lolls a bit to the left, he smiles and nods as we pass. As we head up to the play scape, we pass the basketball court where two young black men in shorts, tee shirts and sneakers are playing. There is a thug under the other backstop, standing on an overturned garbage can he dragged onto the court. He is doing pull-ups in a wife-beater tee shirt, sagging jeans, dingy whitish grey underwear so sweaty they are clinging to the crack of his ass, tims ( Timberlands - the ghetto choice for "work" boots) a do-rag topped by an impeccably straight billed baseball cap. Both his tims and his baseball cap still boast price tags (Minnie Pearl goes Project). As we near the play scape which is divided by height and a "danger factor"(the number of railings) into a section for toddlers and a section for older children, try not to be alarmed by the small black boy, whose upper lip is slimy with snot, teetering at the top of the older children's 'scape. If you look to your right, about 15 feet away you will see, seated at a picnic table a black man, around 30 years old or so, eating McDonald's. If you look closer you will see it is a Happy Meal that he is picking at and as he talks on the phone one can assume that he is the father, grandfather, uncle, older brother, mother's boyfriend, he is snot boy's guardian. Let's follow our baby to the swing area where there is a little black boy around 6 years old quietly saying "help I'm stuck". If you were surveying the area, as you will learn is necessary, you would have seen this boy slip in back by the man with dreds. Tying his left shoe I lift the boy out of the swing and help him to the ground. Without an exchange of pleasantries he takes his backpack from the fence post and skulks alone out of the park. Snot boy is screaming, who knows about what or why, and his guardian does not move.
Look beyond the guardian, to the handball court where you can see about 6 players, all black men, ranging in age from about 25 - 45, and another 10 "fans" again, all black men, cheering and smoking and drinking. It is nearly 2 in the afternoon and I am ready to go home.
To get to the exit gates we cross through the non-working sprinklers and see 2 older black gentleman deep in conversation. Passing the last bench nearest the gate an older Spanish Couple waves to the baby and says "adios". We take a right and then a left back onto Foster Avenue, and as we walk quickly to avoid the rain, the single houses seem to lay down and the apartment buildings which constitute our projects loom defiantly on the horizon.
Nearing our building we are passed by two black men and a black woman pushing a stroller "hey whitey, you so fuckin' white......whitey......" I don't turn towards them. What is the point? I know that as the only "whitey" around I am their target. Understand this, it is not the words that hurt as much as the laughter and the fact that these 3 people are adults approximately our age. The mean and calculative laughter makes the behaviour unbearable. I struggle to keep myself together. Just 1/2 block more. Left foot. Right foot. Left foot. Right foot.
Nearing the front steps to the first of our 2 "security doors" I see the troubled teenager from across the hall. He turns and holds the first door open then unlocks the second door for us. This is the 13 year old who skips school more than he attends. After his mother and older brother leave in the morning he gets high with his friends in the hallway. Often he is rude disruptive and has respect for no one. I have seen him pull a butcher knife on the woman that lives upstairs and the police frequent his doorway in our hall on the 5Th floor. I have seen him pee in the elevator. Today is no different. As I enter the elevator I push the stroller through the pee, willing the wheels "levitate". And this is where I need you to leave. I have reached my breaking point and a sadness from very deep within releases itself. A raw and guttural sob that I am unable to contain escapes me and I begin to shake. At the 5Th floor we enter the hall and navigate carefully through the 2 blobs of silvery spit on the floor.
Today I cannot take this. Today it is not okay. Today I simply cannot be positive. I cannot accept this as my now....this is simply unacceptable. Today I hate just about everyone. I do not hate my child and I do not hate my lover. But I hate you, because you get to leave. And I hate the guy eating McDonald's in the park. I hate the dredded stoner on the bench, and the thug doing pull ups and the parents who have no idea where their 6 year old is (he's leaving the park after being stuck in a swing, he's on his way, don't worry) and I hate the threesome laughing at my expense. I hate you for reading this and for not being able to fully grasp what I am trying to tell you. Today is not my day. Today I am not proud of who I am or what I feel . Today I become what I have fought my whole life. Today and just for today, I am a bigot.