The Little Girls Make an Appearance

I signed the lease this morning.  I spoke to the rental agent about installing some securing measures in the home, including an alarm system, and he agreed.  Upon my second visit to the neighborhood, I felt a bit better about living in the house.  Not because the neighborhood improved overnight or anything,  but because I have become determined to make it work.  Despite the questionable neighborhood, the house itself is great.  A two-story, turn-of-the-century home with a “parlor” in the front and a big yard for Lulu in the back.  As my mom and I were moving things into the house, three little girls from the neighborhood came by to say hello.  I guess, they weren’t really little—they are junior high school students—but they aren’t weathered and hardened like most of the adults in the neighborhood, which gives them a certain youth and innocence that I find charming.  They said how happy they were that someone was moving into the house (apparently, it has been empty for some time now) and they wanted to meet Lulu and talk about their respective pets.  I can’t exactly say why, but after talking to the Little Girls (which will be their collective name henceforth), I felt a certain amount of relief.  Perhaps not the same kind of relief I would feel if just one adult in this neighborhood would acknowledge my presence, but relief nonetheless.   I also knew that if the Little Girls were on my side, they would alert me to any strange activity around my home, since they were out playing in the streets all day until the street lights came on.  Perhaps I will be able to find my place in this neighborhood yet.

Arrival in Dayton-- Where the Hell Am I??

I didn’t write about Dayton the first day I arrived.  I couldn’t.  My first impressions of my new neighborhood were so negative that I needed to sit on it for another day before I wrote anything.   It’s not like I didn’t do my research before moving here.  I did.  I read everything I could get my hands on.  I moved here with the understanding that my new neighborhood is poor, undereducated, underemployed, and overwhelmingly white.  But as I turned down my street for the first time, the decaying sidewalks and dilapidated homes made me apprehensive.  Neighbors turned their heads to watch me as a drove down the street.  This is a neighborhood full of locals and I, with my California tan, white-rimmed sunglasses, and Cali license plates on my car, immediately let everybody know that I’m not from around these parts.   The porch dwellers stared blankly as I hopped out of my car to check out the house.  Now, after living many years in the South, I have seen my fair share of porch-sitters.  I am no stranger to seeing a couch on the porch.  But these folks have 5-piece living room sets on their front porches.   It’s on another level.  As I pull up to the house, I park behind a truck covered in right-wing and moderately racist political bumper stickers.   

Sayings like, “Zoo Has African Lion, White House Has Lying African” and “Danger! Right Wing Extremist On Board” make me wonder if I will be safe in this house, in this neighborhood.  And I could swear I saw the same kids who were “stalking” the Google van in those Google Earth images.  My thoughts?  To quote GOB Bluth from Arrested Development, “I’ve made a huge mistake.”

I went back to the hotel that night and frantically looked for a new place to live.  I wasn’t set to sign the lease until the next morning.  Yes, I would lose my deposit, but my personal safety is most important.  My mom and I both searched the internet and newspaper for another house, but to no avail.  I am going to sign the lease in the morning and hold my breath….

America the Beautiful

The last several days on the road have been interesting.  This country is amazingly beautiful.  We drove through the Rockies, stopping in Denver to see my grandma and meet my cousin’s new baby.   The older I get, the more I appreciate spending time with family—I don’t get nearly enough of it.  As we headed east, we drove through farm country in Kansas, where the golden wheat fields were set against the background of a purplish gray sky.  Ominous looking, but beautiful.  

 The rolling green hills of Missouri were dotted with lovely lakes and ponds all along the way.   I always have associate Missouri with racial strife, prejudice, and white supremacist movements, but apparently there is also beautiful farm land there too.  Who knew?  

I am obsessed with East St. Louis

This was my first time in St. Louis and I have to say, this city is unforgettable.   Yeah, the St. Louis arch is an impressive and imposing figure on the city’s skyline and the architecture of the buildings and bridges is noteworthy, the most striking feature about St. Louis is her lesser sister across the river—East St. Louis.  East St. Louis is one of the most fascinating cities in America.  It is also one of the poorest, most violent, most abandoned and most racially segregated cities in America.  Sure, I have seen St. Louis appear many times at the top of the list for most violent cities in the U.S., but I didn’t exactly know what that looked like until I went there myself.  My mother, the goodtime gambler (I’ve never called her that until right now), wanted to visit a St. Louis casino and the Casino Queen happens to be just across the river in East St. Louis.  I’m not much of a gambler, but I did want to see what East St. Louis was all about, so I figured I would drop off moms at the casino and then drive around East St. Louis  a bit (two birds, ya know?).   Well first of all, I was struck by how abandoned it was.  I was driving for blocks and blocks and never saw a single soul.  There were no businesses or services for blocks.  Nothing.  Not a corner store.  Not a mechanic.  Not a restaurant.  Not a school.  Absolutely nothing except for abandoned buildings and houses, which served as evidence that life did exist there once upon a time.   

Eventually we saw some homes that were occupied by tenants, a few women and their children walking down the sidewalk, and some men hanging out on the corner while others worked on a nearby car.  How could THIS abandoned city be one of the most violent spaces in America?  Well let me tell you, I have spent time in South Atlanta, the Anacostia neighborhood in Washington D.C.,  Harlem, the south side of Chicago, West Baltimore, South Central Los Angeles (in the ‘90s), and the Ninth Ward in New Orleans, and East St. Louis is in a class of its own.   Like most violent cities, East St. Louis has a broken public school system, high unemployment, and insufficient housing.  But with large swaths of the city abandoned, crime is rampant and goes largely unchecked.  While driving through, I couldn’t help but think about how vulnerable I was.  If someone committed a violent crime against me, who would be around to see it and report it? I saw little to no police presence in the city (not that I’m suggesting police are the answer) except near the casino.  The city goes out of its way to protect visitors but seems to do very little to protect the city’s residents.  Later that night at the hotel, I read more about St. Louis and its problems with political corruption, police misconduct, and urban slumlords that make the city’s future precarious at best.  Oh, and did I mention that East St. Louis is overwhelmingly black?  Racial segregation undoubtedly plays an important role in the continued violence and poverty of the city.  I can’t help but wonder about how these same issues will be at work in Dayton.... 

************************POSTSCRIPT*****************************

August 9, 2014, just six days after I posted this blog, Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager was gunned down by a white police officer in Ferguson, MO- a suburb of St. Louis.  The struggle continues....

Vegas, Baby!!

It was my mom’s idea to stop in Vegas on the road trip back east.  I would have chosen to go a little bit farther today, but what could I do? The woman loves to gamble.  On the way here we listened to my Ohio Funk playlist, which I made exclusively for this trip.  Did you know that an insane number of funk bands came from Ohio and many from Dayton in particular?  I didn’t know that until very recently.  Like I said, I’ve been reading up on my new town.

I’m feeling a bit under the weather so I’m just chilling in the hotel with Lulu (my dog) while moms hit the casino—she came up $200! Luck be a lady tonight!!

O-H- Hell Naw?

Today begins the long journey to  Dayton, Ohio where I have recently accepted a job.  While I am extremely grateful to have been offered a tenure-track position (especially in this bleak job market), I am not really sure what to expect in Dayton.  I have only been to Ohio twice in my life.  Once in the late 90s when I visited my college boyfriend during his summer internship in Cincinnati and then again when I traveled to Dayton to interview for this new job.   In the past, I have generally avoided travelling to—and through—the Midwest.  If I may make a gross generalization, I find the region oddly segregated and uncomfortably conservative.   But I am trying to remain open. 

In preparation for my move, I have been reading quite a bit about Dayton—past and present.  From what I can gather, Dayton is a Rust Belt city that used to thrive on industrial jobs and factory production.  When the factories closed and the industry waned, unemployment and other social problems increased.  As it has been explained to me, West Dayton is comprised largely of poor blacks, most of whom descended from migrant southerners, and east Dayton residents are mostly poor whites of Appalachian descent.   Interestingly, nobody I have spoken to would entertain the idea of me living in West Dayton.   Both black people and white people have recommended that I stay away from west Dayton.  Clearly none of those people knows me very well because I have every intention of spending time on the west side, if for no other reason than to see what all the fuss is about. 

Nevertheless, because I could not get any clear intel about west Dayton and because I rented my new place sight-unseen (I couldn’t afford to travel to Dayton before moving there), I have ended up renting a house in east Dayton in a poor white neighborhood.   This will be a first.  Growing up, I lived in predominantly white neighborhoods but they were solidly middle-class.  Since college, I have lived in my fair share of poor neighborhoods in Atlanta, D.C., and New Orleans.  But I have never lived in a white AND poor neighborhood.  I’m not even sure I know what that looks like.  Sure, I’ve seen South Boston on t.v. and I’ve driven through some poor white neighborhoods in Baltimore that look straight out of a John Waters flick, but I have never really spent time in a poor white neighborhood. 

I can’t help but wonder if the existence of urban neighborhoods that are both poor and white are products of a particular brand of segregation that exists predominantly above the Mason-Dixon line—the de facto brand of segregation that was not mandated by Jim Crow laws but rather shaped over time by racial covenants, housing policies, school redistricting strategies, and unspoken social rules.

I am definitely feeling a bit apprehensive about how the neighborhood will receive me—an educated, light-skinned black woman with dreadlocs, eyeglasses, and an attitude that is slightly west coast casual with a tinge of urban disinterest and  flavored with southern style and manners.  I can’t decide if I should try to ingratiate myself to the neighborhood by smiling politely and introducing myself to the locals or if I should mean-mug everyone I see, openly wield my machete in the front yard, and play the role of the crazy black lady living in a white neighborhood.   It’s hard to tell yet.  Statistically, things seem a little rough in east Dayton —violent crime is high, property crime is high, and unemployment is high.  When I google-earthed (yep.  I used it as a verb) my new neighborhood, I saw some tough looking adolescents who were clearly stalking the Google van as it went by taking pictures of the neighborhood.   I doubt they were stalking the van maliciously.  It seemed that they had no idea what the Google van even was.  Either way, it’s no good.

Despite my apprehensions, I am trying to remain open and slightly hopeful about moving to Dayton.  The city has a surprising amount of culture—a ballet, a philharmonic, an opera, an art institute, and countless festivals are among the most evident cultural elements.   And did you know there are more than 70 miles of bike trails in Dayton?  I sure didn’t.  But as a budding cycling enthusiast, this is great news to me.  I guess I will have to find out everything else when I arrive in Dayton in a few days.

Right now I am about to hit the road in my 2002 Toyota Echo—just me, my dog, and my incredibly supportive momma.

First stop on our road trip to the Midwest?  Vegas baby!!

Hey, NOI!! Stop Playin'. Y'all are half-breeds just like me!!

My neighbor ignores me and I really want to know why.

I mean, yes I know he's a member of the Nation of Islam. Yes, I know that they believe white people were created or "bred" from black people by a black scientist named Yakub as some sort of twisted social experiment, which surely that makes me a half-devil. Okay, so that's weird but hey, this is American and its your right to be weird. But this dude next door won't even acknowledge my presence-- won't even look my direction.

When I lived in D.C. I lived near a NOI mosque and no matter how many times I said hi to folks walking in and out of there, none of them would acknowledge me either. Okay. Fine.

Here's the question: Have any of you NOI brothers ever SEEN Louis Farrakhan?? Elijah Muhammad? They are light skinned just like me!! Farrakan got "Indian hair" and ya'll know it. And the founder of the religion-- Wallace D. Fard?? He looks like Jelly Roll Morton-- like a typical New Orleans Seventh Ward Creole. So how does that guy get to be Allah incarnate? If white people are subhuman devils and I, as a half-white devil can't even get a hello from those negroes, how come Fard, Muhammad, and Farrakhan get all the love?

If ever one of those NOI brothers would stop and talk to me, I would ask 'em. (Including you, neighbor dude.)

Death in the Voodoo City

Although I've lived here in New Orleans for a few years and I spend damn near all my time researching and writing about New Orleans, this place never ceases to amaze me. Brass bands and Second Lines are among the best things about this city, yet behind the music and the dancing lies deep cultural traditions tied to rites of passage-- namely funerals. I live near an old Creole mortuary so I certainly see more than my fair share of funerals. But there is something so moving about mourners dancing and rejoicing when their loved ones depart this life. I'm no biblical scholar but i know the Good Book talks about how we should weep when one enters the world and rejoice when they depart this life and pass into to spiritual eternity. I find the concept to be simply beautiful.

Watching people celebrate life and death is spiritually moving and I often wonder who will be dancing when I pass on? New Orleans is not a wealthy city nor is it full of big and important people, yet the lives of ordinary men and women are celebrated with brass bands, lots of food and drink, and sometimes hundreds of friends and family members. i know if I have hundreds of people dancing at my funeral, I either did something really right or REALLY wrong!!

Today, I went outside to watch a 2nd line and the mourners pulled the casket out of the hearse and began dancing on top of it. I have seen people dancing while carrying the casket but I have never seen a casket put on the ground and people get on top of it. I tried to take a couple pictures but there were people everywhere!!

***postscript***
This post was first written in 2009 and I guess I forgot to publish it.  I didn't even finish the post, but I'm publishing in anyway-- 5 years later.