The California Bum

There was a homeless man who routinely slept at the bus stop near our home. He had a good spot. It was a building with a sheltered corner stoop. His area was a full 6 or 8 feet across, so he had room to stretch out if he wanted to. He had wild grey hair and a bushy grey beard. He always wore a military green overcoat, slacks and tennis shoes. He had a small bag with him at all times. He used it as a pillow, and I guess it held his spare clothes. The stench coming off of him was terrible. I never understood how someone could appear so content with such filth all over him. About once a month he'd catch a shower someplace. We could tell because his beard would be clean and he wouldn't stink for a while. Every morning he'd be over at the food trucks, scavenging expired edibles; and every night he'd be sleeping at the corner bus stop. Everyone called him the California Bum, and he had been a fixture in the neighborhood for more than 20 years.

He was one of the "safe" homeless, meaning he wouldn't talk to himself or attack anybody. He never did anything perverted, unlike some of the other bums in the area. I never saw neither alcohol nor drugs around him. He seemed sane and capable of working. It was a mystery as to why he was homeless.

Every once in a blue moon, my sister and I would make some toast with peanut butter and take it to him. We'd get up really early on a Saturday morning and sneak down to the bus stop with our gift wrapped in a paper towel. Feeding the bum was scary and exciting. We weren't suposed to go anywhere near the homeless, they were dangerous. We also didn't want anyone to see us. Being nice to a neighbor was fine, being nice to a bum marked you as a sucker. Getting caught would have opened us to all kinds of victimization from our neighbors. Yet another one of those unwritten rules we had to live by.

We fed him anyway. It was a way of thumbing our noses at the neighborhood. The California Bum was our local landmark, and we didn't want him to move away. As long as he was around, no other homeless person could sleep on his corner. It was important to keep a pervert-free space nearby.

I don't know how well I can convey the value the California Bum held for the neighborhood. We were proud of him. He was something that made us unique. Half the South Side knew about the California Bum. I had friends spend the night just so they could look at him. It was one of those things you'd treasure. "I saw the California Bum... I saw where he sleeps!" Had a lot more power than, "I saw him on the bus... he sat near me."

He disappeared for a month or so in '85. We were worried that our bum had died. A scraggly woman took over his spot, and she would scream at you if you got too close to her. She didn't mooch food at the trucks, she just kind of set up housekeeping at the sheltered corner. She rarely left it and her trash would spill out onto the sidewalk. Everybody resented her. That place belonged to the California Bum and no one else. She was an evil encroacher with no right to be there. The kids would fling trash at her, just to get her going. She'd yell and scream and threaten, but she wouldn't leave the corner. It made it easy for the neighborhood kids to victimize her.

I don't know how our bum got his spot back, but one morning he was sleeping out there again like nothing had happened. I wish I had been awake to see him kicking her off his turf.

Christmas Downtown

Every December we would take the California bus downtown. Mom tried to take us on a day when it was snowing, because snow makes the trip complete. We would ride through gentle white flakes and get off at Locust street. The air was always crisp and refreshing after the stifling heat and smells of the bus. It was great to join the crowd walking around Famous Barr, looking at the window displays. Famous always had the best displays, with trains and teddy bears and lots of animatronics to catch the eye. It was always so magical to me, those bright lights and fake snow showing what Christmas was supposed to look like. Every window had a Christmas tree decorated to perfection. Every entrance had a bell-ringing Santa collecting for the Salvation Army. Mom let us put coins in each bucket we passed as we worked our way around the outside of the store.
There really is nothing to compare to walking in the freezing cold, being bumped, jostled and squeezed while you peer into a world of commercial fantasy. I never heard the bitter, exhausted parents and their whiny overstimulated children. I just blocked it out. I heard instead the Christmas music being played over loudspeakers and the perpetual ringing of those tiny silver handbells. "Cling cling... Thank you ma'am, God bless you." Everyone I noticed was polite and happy; doing charitable works in the spirit of Christmas.
Eventually we would be back where we started, so we'd go inside to see Santa and his Wonderland, which took up the entire 8th floor. Each year some toy maker would sponsor the Wonderland, so the theme would be all about their products. Mattel was great, Lego was awesome, but I think Ty had everyone beat for the all-out magic of Christmas award. Ty did their wonderland with stuffed animals and some of the most amazing animatronics I've seen outside of Disney World. They had sound baffles to deflect and dampen noise; so when you walked through a snowfall-in-the-forest scene, it was quiet enough to hear the motor for the snow machine. Tiny little speakers would project realistic animal sounds or the laughter of children, or whatever was appropriate to the scene you were passing through.
After the Wonderland, we would be shunted into a red hallway that twisted and turned as it led us around to Santa and the exit. I despised the red hallway. The overhead lighting was sucked up by the red fabric covering the walls, so everything seemed dim and bloody. I'd hear the children around me chattering about the long list of toys they wanted and kept my own mouth shut. Asking for things we couldn't afford would only make mom feel guilty. Instead, I'd focus on the grab bags mom bought from the lady in the box halfway through the red corridor.
I was one of those children who asks for the things Santa can't provide. The Christmas of '78, when mom was still working at the grocery store, I asked for a better job so she could buy a house. Then I told him that if the recession was too big, he could bring me a toy horse instead. In '79, I asked for toys for the kids who didn't have Christmas... (you know, the Jewish children) and maybe a toy horse if he had any left over.
Santa would give us a piece of candy and then we'd be out into the brightly lit toy department. We never bought toys from Famous Barr at Christmas. They were too expensive. My sister and I would walk past them pretending we didn't want any of the things they were selling. We would drag mom down to the candy department on the first floor and beg for some Rocky Road chocolate. We knew how much mom loved Rocky Road, and we wanted to reward her for taking us to see the Wonderland. Mom would buy a half pound, and then we'd catch a bus for home. It was one of the best parts of Christmas, and I regret that my son will never see those fabulous displays. Going to a mall just doesn't measure up.

Crossing The Street

Once upon a time, we lived in a 2 family apartment that faced the bar. We stayed there until the woman who owned the property passed away. Her daughter inherited the place, and decided she didn't want to rent to pet owners anymore. This posed quite a problem since my family included a dog, a parakeet and several hamsters. Our new landlady gave us 30 days to find a new place. My sister and I promptly took on extra baby sitting jobs, and when that didn't look like it would be enough money we had a yard sale. We stripped our toy collection to the bare minimum. I even gave up several of my Breyer horses to raise some "moving money".

It is a strange thing to have people picking through your possessions, looking for a bargain. Everything was "make an offer", but we didn't sell very much. Mom came home early and caught us. She was so mad. She made us take everything back inside, then sat us down for a lecture. Mom rarely spanked us, and believe me, there were times I wished for a spanking. At least it would be over with quickly, instead of having to be part of a half hour long guilt session. The end result of this lecture was that we were forbidden to sell or trade any of the things she had worked so hard for. We were not allowed to do any work for anything but college money, and we were not allowed to beg money off of our friends. We had injured her pride, and now she wouldn't even let us help.

My sister and I figured that was it, we'd be homeless. While mom was looking for a new place, J and I thought up ways to keep our textbooks dry or searched the neighborhood for a good location not already in use by the homeless. Now, when my mom sets her mind to something; nothing stands in her way. The upstairs apartment next to the bar was going to be available in about a month and a half. Mom tracked down the landlord and somehow convinced him to let us move in earlier. She borrowed $400 from my grandma and we moved across the street in one day. It wasn't really that hard. Mom had 7 siblings, so we had a constant line of people moving stuff across California Avenue. We must have made quite a picture, because we drew a crowd. One of my uncles would carry a heavy piece of furniture all by himself, and the crowd would cheer. My sister and I would carry an overloaded box without spilling anything, and get applause. We even got some audience participation in the form of car spotters and neighbors bringing us cups of water. My family was probably the most entertaining thing they had seen all year.

That night, for the first time in my life, I slept in my own room.

Fighting

Violence was part of life for me. I saw it daily, and learned that the human body can take a lot of damage before it gives out on a person. I never wanted to inflict that kind of harm on my neighbors, and sometimes it gets thrown in your face. When faced with a fight or flight situation, my response has always been to stare it down. The first real fight I got into was with my best friend, Carol. If you've been reading this, then you already know that Carol hits like a freight train. This story is about how I found that out.
Carol had introduced me to the concept of skipping school. One day we were supposed to skip school together and hang out at the park. I "accidentally" missed my bus, and waited for my friend to come knocking on my door. She never knocked. Around about noon, I was thoroughly pissed; so I wrote her a note and stuck it in her door. Now here's the thing... My mom would never read a note addressed to me, and I assumed that Carol's parents wouldn't either. It never occurred to me that her parents had less than perfect trust in their youngest daughter. So her mom read the note, of course. In my house, this would result in a lecture, and perhaps some grounding. In Carol's house, this meant her dad came home from work early, and was waiting at the front door with the belt. Needless to say, Carol wanted revenge for getting her ass whipped.
I knew nothing of this when mom sent us out to buy a tub of margarine. My sister and I always shopped together, there was safety in numbers. We headed off to the store with a handful of change, and I did not notice Carol lurking on her front steps. The first I knew of any conflict was when she ran up and shoved me from behind. That was Carol to a T. She always struck from behind. She got in my face and started yelling at me because her dad had beaten her ass for skipping school. Idiot me says, "How did he find out?" I was stunned to hear that her mom had actually opened the note.
I told her that we were going to the store, and I'd talk to her after I got back. I also told her that I was sorry she'd gotten a beating. She left, and I thought the matter was over.
We had the store in our sights when Carol came back. She had half the neighborhood kids with her. Shit! Shitshitshit! We dashed into the store, bought the margarine, and then had a discussion about what to do. We couldn't run all the way home; running only makes it worse. We couldn't stay in the store until they all went away, and the pay phone was outside, so we couldn't call for help. I finally decided I'd have to fight her, and probably get the shit kicked out of me. This was gonna suck. I told my sister to take the "butter" home to mom, hoping that my mom would rescue me before I'd lost any teeth. J staunchly refused to leave my side. She said, "I'll help you get home when it's over".
J and I left the store and walked past the waiting throng like they didn't exist. Southside fighting follows a rigid pattern, and we had a chance -although slight- that we'd make it home before the pattern had played out. First is the intimidation phase. The victim walks along while the crowd tells them how bad their beating is going to be. The aggressor says nothing, they let the mob get their 2 cents in. Next the aggressor explains to the victim why they're about to get their ass kicked. This is how you justify the impending bloodshed, and make sure that your audience stays on your side. I had tattled on her, thus breaking our friendship. An ass-kicking was the only way to right the situation. Once everyone is in agreement that a fight should take place, the aggressor shoves her victim. The victim should either shove back or plead their case to try and convert some of the crowd to their side. Then came posing and knuckle cracking, and more threats. The shoving, talking, posing cycle could take 15 or 20 minutes, which was plenty of time for me to make it home; only I didn't play by the rules.
I got half a block from the store, and stopped walking. My sister was pulling on my arm, trying to get me to keep going, but I was full of righteous anger and nothing was going to budge me. I was sick of feeling afraid, sick of the intimidation talk and full of cold, red-headed rage. I said. "Carol. I didn't mean to get you in trouble, and if you feel you need to beat me up because your daddy gave you a whipping then go ahead and try."
I had thrown her off her stride. I wasn't following the pattern. I stared at her and she at me. She didn't know how to proceed. Finally I rolled my eyes and turned to walk home again. She shoved me into the wall. I pushed off the wall and stared up into her face, waiting to see if I'd have to fight yet, or listen to her crack her knuckles. She said, "I'm gonna kick your ass." and raised her fists in a classic pugilist's stance. Before I could think she had hit me. One, two! My lip was bleeding and my right cheekbone was on fire. She paused to see what I would do. She knew I'd never been in a fight before, not a real one at least. Everything around her turned red, and I could see brilliant glowing targets on her body. Places where hitting would do the most damage. A part of me was revelling in the power of my anger, the rest of me was cold and numb. I tried to punch her in the throat. I was playing for keeps. She blocked it, so I raked my fingernails down her breasts and grabbed her by her low cut shirt. I was going for a headbutt, but she was taller than me so my forehead bounced off her teeth instead. We broke apart for a second, and I saw how wide her eyes had gotten. Good! I hope I left scars! She hit me in the face again, but I didn't feel it. I know I was smiling when I kicked her knee. I remember landing a good one in her stomach, but everything gets blurry after that. The red faded after a while, and I realized she was banging my head into the wall. I thought that it should hurt, and wondered why it didn't. Then I pushed her away and started walking home again like nothing had happened.
I was done. I wasn't afraid anymore, and I didn't want to fight my best friend. I just wanted to go home.
She pushed me from behind, and screamed, "Fight me!"
I said, "No."
She pushed me again, and I just kept walking. She pushed me a third tims and I turned around and said, "You got your fight. I'm going home." I stood there waiting to see if she was going to hit me some more, and when she went into posing mode I walked away. A few seconds later she ran up and hit me from behind again, so I turned around and said, "Do I have to walk backwards to keep you from hitting me?"
I was putting action to my words, walking backwards as I spoke. The mood of the mob began to shift. Suddenly, someone in the crowd said, "You leave her alone! You guys is supposed to be friends!" Relief washed over me, and tears started to run down my face. I kept talking as I was moving. "You won't hit me to my face. You have to hit me when my back is turned. Whyn't you face me? You gotta hit me from behind. Some friend you are. I can't believe I have to walk home backwards because you're too cowardly to hit me to my face."
I don't have the slightest idea where all this came from. Clearly she was not afraid to hit me. She already had, repeatedly. Yet for some reason she couldn't hit me anymore. I wasn't trying to taunt her into another fight, but I was trying to punish her for fighting me in the first place. I don't know why, but this swayed the opinion of the kids around us and suddenly Carol was in the wrong for wanting to beat me up.
Some of the kids went home, and the rest split into 2 groups. One berating Carol for fighting, the other telling me how cool I was. To this day, I don't get it. We travelled the rest of the way home unmolested. I was told to go ahead and walk forward, because they'd be watching my back.
When we got home, mom freaked. She took me into the bathroom and washed my split lip with peroxide, then she taught me how to fight. I'll never forget my good, christian mom telling me to fight dirty if I had to fight at all.

Why You Shouldn't Skip School or How I Lost My Virginity

It was a good day to cut school. The sun was shining in a cloudless blue sky. The air was warm, but not muggy. Being in a river valley, St. Louis tends to have air thick enough to swim in. I decided to walk to N's bus stop instead of mine that day. If I got out of the house early enough, I'd take her bus. I got to walk past run-down victorian homes with huge windows and cute little turrets. I would always imagine living in one of those architectural wonders someday. I had dreams of buying a whole block, and returning them to their original state. I was a 15 year old kid, so functional obsolescence was not a part of my vocabulary.
I met N at her bus stop, and she was deep in conversation with another friend. T had a new boyfriend, but she wasn't sure she could trust him, so she was looking for someone to check him out for her. N and I happily volunteered for the job. Everyone in my neighborhood had skipped school at least once to spend the day with a friends' boyfriend or girlfriend. This was called "checking them out". It was a way to keep your friends from getting involved with someone not worthy of them. Never mind that you were putting your own self at risk. You checked out their dates, and they checked out yours. It was part of the South Side Code.
We hid behind some bushes when the bus came, then wandered around looking for something to do until N's mom left for work. When the coast was clear we headed to her house. N lived in a section 8 townhome, and if we weren't great friends I would have been jealous. Her mom paid $64 a month for a thousand square feet of sheer luxury. They had 2 bathrooms and own washer and dryer! We made breakfast, watched some tv and then headed out to the boyfriend's place. Along the way we ran into Joyce. She had actually graduated high school, and I idolized her for her common sense and maturity. She decided to come along with us. She thought it was a bad idea for two adolescent girls to go to a strange boys apartment.
G lived over by Roosevelt High, so we had to walk across several grassy medians to get there. I always look at the grass when I walk across it, and I spotted a four leaf clover. I stopped, and thought about picking it, then decided to let it be. Perhaps the mutation would spread, and the next spring would see a whole median of four leaf clovers.
G invited us in and offered us beer. N and Joyce each had one, while G and I opted for wine coolers. He was hispanic, that was a surprise. We didn't usually date other races, but, to each her own. His hair was thick and glossy, and he seemed reasonably fit. So far, so good. The apartment was cleanish, I didn't see too many roaches... he even rolled a joint for us. Pot smoking was one of those ways you could get acquainted with someone. I took a puff every time it was passed to me, even though I didn't care for the effects. Joyce was doing it, so it must be ok. I thought. I was already tipsy, and now I was stoned on top of it. Joyce and I went to sit in the living room, while N stayed to chat with G in the kitchen.
Some time later, I went looking for them and found them smootching in his bedroom. That was unacceptable! You don't kiss on your friend's boyfriend! I knew N was drunk and stoned, and therefore she couldn't be held responsible for her behavior. I broke them up saying, "Hey, why don't you guys come into the living room. Or do you expect us to entertain ourselves?" I pretended not to notice her smeared lipstick or flustered appearance. She dragged me into the bathroom and thanked me for stopping her. She didn't want to lose her virginity to this guy, and she was afraid she would have. we left the bathroom and found G kissing on Joyce! N said "Huh uh! You're supposed to be dating T!" and dragged him by his hair off of her. We decided it was time to go home. G decided to tag along. I don't know why we let him, but we did.
We headed back to N's house, me drinking wine coolers the whole way. They were so tasty! We chatted as we walked, all of us acting like nothing had happened. The conversation turned to sex, and I stated that I was a virgin. I was saving myself for the right time. I chattered on about how I would know when the time came, and that I hoped I wouldn't be stupid enough to lose it to some guy at a party. I guess G took that for an invitation.
When we got to N's, she went upstairs to plug in her curling iron so we could fix our hair. I decided to sit downstairs with Joyce. I wasn't about to leave her alone with this guy. I thoroughly distrusted him at this point, so I played watchdog while N did her hair. She returned, freshly moussed and curled, and I turned the guard duty over to her. I just wanted to get away from him. I went upstairs to N's bedroom, and started curling my bangs. G came up the stairs and stood in her doorway. I felt like a trapped rabbit. I said, "Excuse me." and tried to squeeze past him. He pressed me against the door jamb and kissed me. I shoved him away and went into the bathroom, and he followed me. "Smooth move, Ex-Lax!" I thought. I was not stuck in an even smaller space than before. Something clicked in my head and I started poking him in the chest while berating him for his attitude. The poking caused him to back off, but he was blocking the stairs, so I returned to N's room. My plan was to lock the door and wait him out. I wasn't fast enough. He was in the room and closing the door before I could react. I sized him up, and decided I could get to the door and scream before anything happened. I'd look like a fool, but I wouldn't be trapped anymore. It was a fair trade.
I grabbed the door handle and he spun me around and pinned me to the door. I went to shove my knee in his balls, but it didn't work. He stuck his tongue down my throat and pulled down my jeans. God he was quick. I didn't know what to do. My usually agile mind was blank. I pushed on his chest and said, "No!" The next thing I knew, I was falling toward the floor with him on top of me. I thought, "Oh, God. He's going to rape me." He was still french kissing me, so I bit his tongue as hard as I could. He pulled back, and I thought for a second that he'd go away, then I saw that he was going to punch me for biting him.
Visions of other rape victims flashed through my head. I saw their brutally beaten faces, and heard some anchor man saying, "Most victims of rape are brutally beaten for resisting." And I froze. I just kind of dropped into shock and didn't move as he penetrated me. I was stuck in my head, thinking odd random thoughts while he did his thing. I wondered where my underpants had gone to. I considered the rug-burn I was getting on my back, butt and thighs. I worried that N would see the blood from my broken hymen on her carpet, and tried to imagine cleaning it up before she saw. I replayed the whole day in my mind. Seeing points where I could have stopped this in little flash-clips of memory.
...If I had taken the bus...If N's mom left for work late...If I had picked that 4 leaf clover... Then he was done, and kindly re-buttoning my jeans. He smiled and offered me a hand up off the floor. He said, "That was great, wasn't it?" then, "How do you feel?" I got up and said, "You raped me, how am I supposed to feel?" He at least had the decency to blush. He said, "I didn't rape you." And I replied, "Yes. You did." There was an uncomfortable pause, then I stated, "I told you no. You didn't listen. I bit your tongue and you raped me." He responded with, "I pulled out before I came, so you don't have to worry about getting pregnant." I coldly thought how ironic it was that I had gone on the pill a month and a half earlier, because one day I'd want to give my virginity to my boyfriend, and I wanted nothing to stand in my way.
I wasn't angry, I wasn't weepy, I was just numb. I looked for something good in the situation. Mom taught me that every bad has a good to go with it. She also taught me to be polite under any circumstances. I searched and searched, and found only one thing. I said to him, "Thank you. Now it won't hurt when I have sex with someone I love." After that he left the room, and I went back to curling my hair. I needed to finish curling my hair. I needed to look normal. I needed to wake up and feel something. When my hair was done, and I couldn't stall any longer, I went downstairs. That bastard was still there. I was 15, I was skipping school, and I'd been drinking. I couldn't go to the police. If they don't jump out of the bushes at you, is it still rape? I knew in my heart that it was, but would the cops see it that way? I felt displaced. My friends sat there having normal conversation with my rapist, and they didn't know what had just happened. There was no sign that I had just shed the last piece of my childhood.
I sat on the arm of the sofa, feeling a squishy bruised wetness in my vagina. Nobody had ever told me that sex was wet. I wondered where all the wetness had come from. It didn't feel like a period, it felt like slug slime. I watched my friends joke and laugh, and joined in while silently wishing G would just leave already. He stayed for an hour and a half. I kept debating whether it was rape or just sex-I-didn't-want-to-have. I wanted to laugh out loud because I had thanked him, but it wasn't funny. Nothing was funny.
When he finally went home, N said to me, "Well? What did you think of him?" I said, "He raped me."
Joyce stared, and N laughed one short bark of laughter. I just looked at her as the truth dawned on her. Her eyes grew round and she said, "Oh my God, you're serious." Then I cried. I told them the whole story, crying the whole time. N scavenged up some vodka while Joyce held me and let me cry it out.
They walked me home in silence. The sky was still a beautiful bright blue, the air was still pleasantly warm without a trace of humidity. The world around me was still the same, but I could finally see how run down and crappy my neighborhood was. There were no more gemstones in the gutters, only broken glass. The setting sun didn't light up the buildings with it's rosy glow, it made them bloody. I wanted it to hurt, and I still felt nothing. The sun was too bright because my pupils were dilated from shock.
It took a couple of weeks for me to get back to normal. The shock wore off after a few days, but I still needed to put the event in it's place in my head. I told my boyfriend what had happened about 3 weeks afterward. He broke up with me. My friends called him up and told him what kind of scum he was, so he came back and told me he would "forgive me". Excuse me? Forgive me for what? Going into shock? His arrogance really helped snap me back to myself. I had a choice. I could mourn 15 minutes of my life forever, or I could get over it. I chose to get over it.

For those of you who've been there, you know that's not as easy as it sounds. I acted like I'd gotten over it, until I finally had. I had flashbacks for years. A look, or a scent or a texture would send me back; and I would lash out at my partner, then cry all over him. For a while, I let myself flash back. I used it as a litmus test for my boyfriends. If they responded appropriately, I'd keep them a while. If they weren't understanding, I'd ditch them. All that ended when I befriended JW. He heard the story from his girlfriend, and pumped me for information. JW actually found G. He told me he knew where the bastard was, and asked me what kind of revenge would be appropriate. Oh, yeah! I'd been planning this one for 3 years!!! I listed the tortures I had imagined for him. JW said that could be arranged, and he would even pay for it. It wasn't right, a great girl like me getting raped. Then he said, "Of course...They'd have to kill him afterwards. They can't do all that stuff and let him go."
I recoiled from the thought. How could I ask for his death, when I not only lived -but thrived? Nope. It was time to give up my desire for vengance. Although there's a secret part of me that still hopes a truckload of men anally violate him some bright sunny day.

Apologies to my readers -and thank you for reading me! I hope you understand that these tales come to me in chunks. Sometimes it's hard to look back on my past, sometimes it's easy.

In the interrim, here's a joke I found recently...
How can you tell when a redhead has been using your computer?

There's a hammer stuck in the monitor.

surreal moments (non-neighborhood story)

There are moments in my life when I know something is a bad idea, but I'm swept into doing it anyway. When this happens the world seems dark and surreal to me. This story is about one of those times. It's not related to my neighborhood, just a thing that happened to me. It's been sitting in the back of my head since I wrote "The Price of a Good Education".

We moved onto California Avenue when I was in the third grade. It was the first year girls were allowed to wear slacks during winter. The uniform pants were brown polyester, not comfy, but warmer than a skirt. I'm glad mom couldn't afford the more expensive wool ones because what happened was, I needed to go to the bathroom. My teacher gave me a hall pass to go potty, and when I stepped into the hallway I saw Mikey, who had also gotten a potty pass. He wasn't in the bathroom like he should be, he was swinging on his locker door. This was just bizarre. The hall was unusually quiet. I could hear the standard classroom noises, and I could hear Mikey's door squeak, but the air felt very still. It was alot like the feeling before a storm, when the area around you seems to be just waiting. I felt disconnected from the rest of the school. It was just me and the row of lockers, and Mikey didn't seem to fit the picture. He wasn't supposed to be there.
The hallway was dim. The school only turned on the hall lights when they absolutely had to. I really needed to go to the bathroom, but I thought, "I should get my books out of my locker first, it will make it easier when school lets out." (which was in about 15 minutes)
So, instead of going to the bathroom like a good little girl, I went to my locker. As I passed Mikey, I said, "You shouldn't be doing that. You'll get in trouble." He ignored me and continued swinging back and forth on his locker door. I opened my locker, and started rummaging in my book bag. I was really bothered by Mikey swinging on that door. Creak, creak... it wasn't right. I couldn't get my mind around him being there. He was moving the whole row of lockers with his stupid swinging, and it was hard to get my book bag out because of the motion.
I felt my back get all prickly, then suddenly I stood up and turned to walk away from the lockers. I wasn't even thinking, just moving. As I was rising, my eyes noticed the lockers leaning toward me. I tried to pivot and wind up in the open space as I realized the entire row of lockers was coming down on top of me. I sort of made it. I wound up with my upper body and head inside my locker, the rest was being weighed down my a lot of steel. Something was digging into the middle of my spine, and it hurt to breathe. On top of all that, I had the indignity of laying in a puddle of my own urine. (ew) I imagined Mikey stuck in his locker, like I was stuck in mine. I hoped he had made it all the way in; but if he hadn't, at least he was taking some of the weight off my back.
I called out, "Mikey? Are you in your locker?"
He said, "No, just my arm."
I waited for him to ask me if I was hurt, but he didn't ask. He started calling for help, and I just laid there trying to breathe. People came out in the hallway, and someone ran for Father Ross. I started thinking everybody would laugh when they pulled me out and saw all the pee. I willed my polyester pants to soak some of it up, but polyester isn't really absorbent. I couldn't feel my legs very well anymore, and I heard Mikey say, "Sharon's under there." So then they were afraid to move the lockers, and started shooing kids back to class.
Presently, I heard my teacher calling softly, "Sharon? Sharon? Where are you?"
I replied, "I'm in my locker."
She asked, "Are you hurt?"
So I said, "Yes. I can't move my legs, and there's something on my back. Could you get these lockers off me?"
I was scared, and trying not to cry. I thought maybe if I was super-nice and used my please and thank you's they would take these horribly heavy lockers off of me, so I added, "Please?"
She said, "We can't do that, Father Ross is getting help."
I started crying and said, "I'd really like to get out of my locker. It hurts."
Nobody had anything to say to that, then the bell rang for dismissal. I had been stuck for 15 minutes. It seemed like forever, but it also seemed like no time at all. I listened to the children being herded out the door, and wondered if they could smell my pee as they passed. I could sure smell it! I focused on their passage, and thought about the bright sunny day waiting for me. I imagined myself playing at the park. I used those images to calm myself down. Crying didn't do me any good, and it made my back hurt worse than ever. It had gone from a generally squished feeling to a small stabbing pain in my spine. Fr. Ross came back with a bunch of 8th graders, and the lockers shifted for a moment. Mikey had been crying on and off, but now that his arm was freed, he was fine. My teacher said, "Were getting you out next. Are you stuck anywhere?"
I said "I'm stuck under the lockers!"

I know she meant "is some part of you going to get hurt worse if we move these things" and I know I meant "no! now get them off me!" But that's not what either of us said. Father Ross counted to three, then he and five 8th grade boys lifted the lockers and pushed them against the wall. The hallway air never seemed so fresh! They all stared at me, and when I lifted my head to look around they told me not to move. Then the adults debated whether to move me or not. I had a back injury, it could be broken. They couldn't move me, but they couldn't leave me laying there, either. I thought perhaps we should wait for the ambulance, and said so. I don't even know if they heard me. I felt like a particularly difficult engineering problem, not a person. They finally decided the best way to do it would be to roll me onto my back and carry me by my arms and legs. My teacher fussed around the boys, telling them to be careful with me. One of them grabbed my forearms, the other my ankles; they carried me slung between them like a hammock. Every step they took hurt.

I looked back at the puddle of pee I had left, and wondered who would clean it up. Then I looked at the boy holding my ankles. He was trying to be careful, but not get his hands wet. I said to him, "I'm sorry." He replied, "I hope you're ok."
They laid me down in the back seat of Father Ross' car, and he drove me to Cardinal Glennon Hospital. I asked a lot of questions on the way there. "Why did the lockers fall down? Does my mom know? Is Mikey ok? Do you think I'll be ok? I think I'm ok. Did you ever get hurt like this?" and so on. Mom met me at the hospital, she was very calm while we waited for X-rays and such. Nothing was broken. I had bruised my back pretty badly, tho. They thought the thing I felt digging into my back was the handle of the locker next to mine.

They wanted to burn down the Cup Factory

When I was 17, my boyfriend loaned me $800 to buy a car. This led to me working the only job I hated, but that's a different story. When the car was paid off, I became a delivery driver for Dominos Pizza. This was lots of fun, and profitable too. I could bring home $60 to $80 a night on weekends, and I received a paycheck for about $175 every other week. I earned enough for fast food, cigarettes and books with money left over to help mom pay the utilities.

Mom was still working at Royal Papers Inc. She did accounts payable, and was getting paid around seven dollars an hour. Royal Papers was a distribution warehouse for paper and plastic products. They bought from companies like Dixie, Fort and Georgia Paper, and resold it in smaller quantities to local businesses. They had recently been bought by Villa Lighting, and Villa had purchased 5 brand new trucks for the company. Those 5 trucks and the kindness of strangers saved my mom's job one winter night, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

One night I was working at Dominos in the middle of a bitter cold snap. Cold is good for pizza drivers, we get lots of orders in bad weather. I had been called into work even though it was my night off. I didn't want to go. I wanted to stay home with my mom that night, although I had no reason and usually took every opportunity to earn money. I went to work because they needed me, and I went out on a delivery and saw the sky lit up with fire. Big fires are rare in St. Louis, so I turned on the radio to find out what could make that kind of blaze. I heard, "...on Vandeventer, near Choteau... Villa Lighting appears to be on fire. 80 firefighters are on location right now."
And I knew. It wasn't Villa, it was Royal Papers. Villa had nothing that would burn like that, but a warehouse full of paper products would. I rushed back to the store and asked my manager if I could go home, my mom's work was burning down, and she would need me. He said, "We need you here more." I spent that long, long shift trying to talk myself into quitting school so I could work full time. I could always get my GED, and go to college later, I thought. I can't describe how much that hurt to think about. At the time, I had already saved almost a thousand dollars for college. I had priced an associates degree at the community college, and checked out my options for St. Louis University for my Bachelor's Degree. I had it all planned. I needed about three grand to get started, and I could cover the rest with 30 hours a week and maybe a few student loans. I had long since learned that most plans go straight down the tubes when they meet with life, but I've always been an optimist.

My awesome co-workers gave me as many good tipping runs as they could find, and when I finally got off work it was with more than $120 on my pocket. My mom was in tears when I got home, and she wouldn't take the money from me. I insisted, she refused, and then we cried together in front of the television watching her life burn in a beautiful pyromantic display. The phone rang all night long. All the employees were calling each other to worry over their jobs, the company and the valiant firefighters who were trying to keep the blaze from spreading to other buildings. 200 firefighters, some from as far away as Chesterfield came to save what they could, and we prayed for each and every one of them.

Around 11 o'clock, mom got a call from one of the drivers. All the drivers lived in Illinois, and four of them had driven into St. Louis to try to save the brand new trucks. They arrived and told the firefighters they needed to get those trucks! The firefighters said it was too dangerous, they were butted up against the building, and the wall was going to collapse. One driver (who's name I sadly can't remember) said, "Please! You've got to let us in, that's all the inventory we have left!"
One of the firefighters said, "You've got 5 minutes. Save what you can." The drivers needed no more encouragement. They grabbed a tow chain to tie 2 of the trucks together, and hauled ass outta there! It must have been a beautiful sight. Four 18 wheelers smashing through the chain link fence, towing a fifth one behind. Not more than a few minutes later, five stories of brick wall came down where the trucks had been. That must have been a sight too. Royal Papers had inventory! And I could go to school!

Some time after midnight, mom got a call to show up at Villa Lighting for work the next day. It would be their temporary home while the bosses decided whether to try again or just give up. The next day, mom was very busy answering calls from customers. "Yes, that was us on fire. Yes, we are still in business." She stretched the inventory in those 5 trucks to include every customer who called. "The trucks were saved, so you'll get your products on X day." Meanwhile, others were busy talking to their competitors, all of whom gladly helped out. They sold their inventory to Royal at cost, letting Royal's trucks pick up from their warehouses. By the end of the week, management had found a new warehouse; and within 2 weeks, mom had an office to work from again.

The blaze was started by a pair of children, aged 7 and 9. They thought it would be fun to "burn down the cup factory" and they made malotov cocktails out of beer bottles and kerosene. I can't imagine how many of those bottles they must have thrown through the windows, because Royal had a damn good sprinkler system.

One wall survived, and you could see the twisted remnants of the iron elevator shaft.

Bicycle Freedom

Before we moved onto California Avenue, my sister and I both had bikes. Mom bought them for us the Christmas after dad had left. Mine was electric blue, J's was pink and white. When we moved, J and I immediately set out to explore our new neighborhood. We found a small park 2 blocks to the North, and a candy store 3 blocks West of our new home. Given a choice, we would have biked to school too.

One day, we rode to the candy store with J's best friend D. We left our bikes parked in front like we always did, and when we came out they were gone. We ran to D's house and her mom called the police. I described my bike in detail to them, all the way down to the broken spoke and the scratches in the paint, but I never saw my bike again. A few days later D and her mom were called down to the police station. They had found her bright red Mongoose bike. My mom was livid. She seemed to take it as a personal affront that the expensive bike had been found, yet her children remained bicycle-less. She spent a lunch hour at the police station raising a stink about it, but they couldn't return what they didn't have.

The next spring, Hosea House opened it's doors and I got a replacement bike for $5. It was neon green and the bannana-seat was covered in hippie daisies. I hated the look of that bike. It was so ugly in comparison to my blue one. My sister told me to get over it, at least I had a bike again. She was right, so I took the ugly bike out in public expecting ridicule at every turn. (heh) It never happened. Nobody but me thought my bike was funny looking. I had forgotten how freeing it was to pedal as fast as I could, the air pushing against my body. It felt like flying. Within a month I had come to love that green bike.

Ahhh, freedom!

Envy Part One

There were many things I envied as a child. I wanted an Atari game system, and a Merlin. I wanted a vacuum cleaner and real gold earrings. I wanted a dad who would go off to work, so I could have my mom at home. Wanting these things wasn't going to bring them into actualization, and I did just fine without them. Sometimes it was painful to see my friends' birthday and christmas presents that far outstripped my own. It was the pain of a child who knows it's just the way things are, yet it still seems unjust. Sometimes I felt very isolated, more often I felt like I somehow wasn't good enough. I did a lot of good deeds hoping that just one more would put us over the top, and presents would flow my family's way.
I didn't get that we got Catholic school instead of expensive presents. I knew mom was making tough choices everyday, and that each choice was intended to give my sister and I a better future. I didn't know why we couldn't have school and an Atari. My sister's best friend had a lot of money, but I wouldn't trade with her for the world. The money came from her dad's pension, because her dad was dead. She had a lot of stuff, but she didn't have joy. I got to see firsthand the difference between earning your toys and having them handed to you on a silver platter. She seemed to get a new, pricey toy every month, and she didn't value any of them. I know she would have given it all up to see her dad's face just one more time.

I thought I knew envy, and then I went to public school. I met kids on welfare, living in section 8 housing with better clothes than me. When I transferred to Waring, it was in the middle of the school year. Mom had already spent her money on school uniforms, and we had very little left. She decided to skip the gas bill for a month and took me shopping for school clothes instead. We bought one pair of jeans and three shirts. The welfare kids teased me because I wore the same pair of jeans every day. We went to the laundromat every other week, so my jeans saw a lot of handwashing in the tub. I went to school with damp jeans quite a bit, because the only way to dry them was to hang them over the heater vent in the hallway. Mom went to the carnival supply store and bought hooks that looked like fingers, and screwed one into the plaster wall. She let me paint the fingernail red, and that became my "jeans hook". It was pretty cool.
One day in January, the seat of my jeans tore. They were so worn out there was no real way to patch them. The fabric wasn't strong enough to hold the stitches. The school wouldn't send me home, so I endured the teasing for the rest of the day and walked home from the bus stop with my winter coat tied around my waist so no one could see. It was one of those moments that still makes me squirm inside when I think about it. I'm a redhead, so I'm used to teasing. Yet, no amount of "carrot top" or "Woo! Red!" had prepared me for ripping my only pair of jeans.

My Aunt came by that night with an armload of clothes for me. She was very angry at my mom for not saying something sooner. All the clothes were hand-me-downs, and I didn't want to wear her bell bottom jeans with stars on the butt. The shirts were pretty cool, and she even brought me a blue fuzzy sweater. I wore the sweater the next day, along with the bell bottoms, and those unmerciful bastard children started calling me "Salvation Army Reject". They probably thought it hurt my feelings, but cast off clothes were better than holey jeans any day, and at least I wasn't on welfare. The first time I opened my mouth and said "Yeah, well, my momma works for a living," I almost got my ass kicked. They didn't want to hear that, and they went in search of easier prey.
I did envy the welfare kids for having things we couldn't afford, but it was still that kind of "somehow I'm not good enough" kind of envy. I experienced the true green-eyed monster when we had a dress-up day at school, everyone was supposed to dress like babies. A friend of mine, who weighed over 300 pounds, came to school in footie pajamas. He was 6'3", and his mother had made them by hand just for the occasion. I was so jealous, because that's the kind of thing my mom would have done for me, if she had had the time - if she weren't working all the time. Nobody teased him - they all thought it was as cool as I did.

Shopping

When we were children, back-to-school was an exciting time for us. We would take last year's uniforms out of storage and try them on to see if they still fit. Then we'd go to St. Francis De Sales church and buy used uniforms, if the old ones couldn't be let out any more. We would walk 8 blocks to Cherokee Street and buy our school supplies at Woolworth’s. Then we would wait.

While my child self is waiting, suspended in the airless void that is memory, let me explain about Cherokee Street. It's a 2 mile long stretch of road along which you can buy practically anything. The eastern third of the street is Antique Row. This meant "county people only" in my book. I used to dream about walking down Antique Row with pocketsfull of hundred dollar bills, buying tiffany lamps and hand woven rugs and solid wood furniture older than my grandmother. I shopped there as an adult, and was sorely disappointed. Most of the shops were nothing more than a high priced flea market. I did find, and buy a glorious shag rug covered in earth tone swirls and paisleys. It is without a doubt, the ugliest rug I've ever seen. It looks like psychedelic vomit that has begun to grow orange fur. My husband collects 70's kitsch, and absolutely loves it.
The Western 2/3rds of Cherokee Street held storefronts of all sizes selling anything from rolling papers to fur coats. There still is a store called Globe Drug. I assume at one time, they had a pharmacy, but they didn't when we shopped there. We bought loose leaf paper with printing errors, folders for a penny apiece and sometimes cheap underwear. Globe Drug was dimly lit, with narrow aisles and narrower shelves. The walls were yellow from decades of tobacco smoke, and everything was factory overstock or flawed, but it was all dirt cheap! Mom taught us how to find bargains amid the mountains of junk, how to check the expiration dates on their boxed food and where to draw the line between bargain and waste of money. It was fine to buy irregular towels or panties, but never irregular shirts or pants. If the price was very good, it might be worth your time to buy it and fix it at home. We didn't own a sewing machine; so all tailoring was done by hand.
We never went into the roller skate shop, or the custom T-shirt store. The Head Shops had beautiful hookahs and bongs, and feathers on alligator clips right in the windows. I wanted a hookah because it was pretty, and my child's mind thought it was for making coffee. I remember pleading with my mom, trying to convince her that she was good enough for that fancy coffee service in the window, and how neat it was that you could pour 2 cups at once. (those being the hoses coming off either side) She would smile, or laugh and say, "I really don't want that kind of coffee service. My percolator makes better coffee anyway." I don't know how she kept from bursting with laughter, but she always did.

When the end of the back-to-school season came, our waiting was done. We would get up at 6 in the morning, eat a good breakfast and take a bus to Cherokee street. Taking the bus signified the specialness of the occasion. It meant our time was too valuable to waste on walking. We'd get off the California bus at Cherokee and walk 3 blocks to the 2 story department store. There would be a small crowd of bargain hunters waiting outside and we would join them, sitting with our butts up against the front doors, staking out our turf. We would sing traveling songs or play word games while we waited the 2 or more hours for the doors to open. In hindsight, we were probably pretty annoying. When the doors finally opened we would rush in, along with all the other eager shoppers. We'd split up, Mom would head for whatever we had overheard our neighbors-in-waiting talking about, since she was biggest. J and I would head for other things. Generally one would go for jeans, one for shirts, and one for work clothes. We'd grab all we could then meet by the cash register and start trading. Having lived this experience for several seasons, I would never want to work on the trading floor of Wall Street. J and I would sit on our stash of clothes and Mom would pull an item from the pile. She'd check the size, and if it didn't fit she'd yell out, "I have a 12! Who's got an 8?!" And the bargaining would begin. Women would become convinced that we had already nabbed the best stuff, and do our fighting for us to get the sizes we needed. My sister and I got stepped on and shoved, but we came away with a few pieces of new clothes for each of us. We always checked for tears before we reached the cash register, and the clothes almost always had dirt and footprints on them, but clothes can wash.

Walking

Whenever we had extra cash, it was always a toss up as to whether we should spend any of it on bus fare. When it was below 20 degrees, or above 90 degrees, we rode the bus to our destination. Any other time, we walked. (If you're interested in my old neighborhood, you can go to your favorite online map site and get a map centered on a single address. I just went to mapsonus.com, and it gave me a nice map of my old stompin' grounds)
We walked to the Tru-Buy grocery store (2 blocks) and the Free-Dry laundromat (9 blocks). We walked to church and school and Cherokee Street for shopping. As mom's pay scale rose, so did the distances we'd travel. Finally, we could afford to shop at K-Mart. Traveling on foot really broadens your perspective on the world. Distances were not marked by stoplights or main streets; they were marked by hills and houses it was best to avoid. To go to K-Mart, we'd leave the house and walk South to Gravois Ave. Gravois cuts diagonally through the city, so our route would then lead South West to Grand Ave. There was a flat stretch past the used car dealership and the Laclede Gas building. Then it was a slight rise past another used car place and the soft serve ice cream store. (now Cardinal Motors, yet another used car dealership) We went to the soft serve ice cream place every Monday night, during summer, and it always gave me a good feeling to pass it. Next came several blocks uphill, and we'd pass the public grade school (have to drive past it and remember the name) and Roosevelt High School. Then a beautiful downhill stretch that would quicken our pace and revive our flagging energies. This section had nice houses, and grass instead of weeds. People actually grew flowers in their front yards, and the air had a cool, fresh scent because there were huge shade trees here and there. From the bottom of that beautiful hill, you could look up and see the stoplights at Grand and Gravois. We were half way to our destination. Climbing the next hill took us away from the nice homes with their shady trees. The higher we climbed, the closer the houses grew to the street. From this point on, we actually zigzagged across Gravois. We would cross to the South East side to avoid the apartments with tenants, but no windows. The windows having been long since broken out, and the shards used as weapons. The drunken hoosiers who lived in these buildings used the same temperature scale we did, so any time we were out walking, they were out drinking on their steps. We could hear their catcalls from across the street. "Wooo! Baby! Whyn'tchoo come over here and sit on my face for a bit?" And such. This was far better than the alternative. My sister and I had walked this route a few times alone, and had occasionally refused to cross the street. We were tough, and no 300 lb drunken fool was going to have us running to the safe side of the street. The result was always the same. Walking past meant getting your ass grabbed as you went by. We'd pretend not to notice, our faces burning in shame, while the hoosiers would laugh and call out their tiny repertoire of "compliments". The first time this happened I was 10 years old.
I need to sidetrack here, for a moment. To the men that read these stories- Has any woman smiled and accepted a crude proposition from you? I don't know of any women who have. I can accept it as the compliment it is, you find me attractive... thanks! In a small minded way, it is a compliment, but it's never going to get you anything. The whole process seems like a waste of breath to me. OK, back to the story

So, we crossed the street. We'd cross again at the Velvet Freeze, to avoid the bored teenagers hanging out in front of the place, then half a block later cross again to avoid more drinkers. The ugly stretch was maybe 1/4 mile, probably less, but it was all up hill. So there we were, 2 small kids and one short adult, tacking our way uphill to K-Mart.
Sometimes we'd stop in at the White Castles at Grand and Gravois and enjoy a 20 cent burger and the colorful mix of homeless, shoppers and bus-people. The air conditioning was nice too. From there it was a 3 block hop to the K-Mart Plaza. The walk usually took about 40 minutes. We would spend all day shopping, waiting for the sun to go down. This served multiple purposes. By 7 o' clock, the drunks were usually passed out or gone to the nearest bar so we could travel home relatively unmolested. Also the walk home was cooler (in winter, this meant a rare and joyful bus ride) and shopping all day meant 5 hours of decent climate control. Nice!

The Price of a Good Education

My sister went to St. Elizabeth's High School. It was an all-girls Catholic school. It offered Latin as a language, that's how elite this school was. She bought her uniforms herself. She did charity work to help offset the cost. She worked as a coat check girl on the weekends and baby-sat weeknights and did all her homework and kept her grades up. Her eyes were fixed firmly on that most miraculous of prizes -College. She never wavered from that goal. She was proud of her school, and proud of herself... and she deserved it!
She saved her money and bought a St. Elizabeth's jacket, it cost $40. She wore it all the time. I think that jacket was a statement for her, but it was practical too. It was warm and it was weather resistant. She had earned the right to wear her bright red St. Elizabeth's jacket. Earned or not, it brought all sorts of trouble to her.
There was a girl in our neighborhood named S. S was tall and fat and filled with bitterness. Oh, and she was a slut too. She had no future and an ugly past, and she hated my sister. J was everything S was not. J was slender and petite and popular because she was fun to be around. S was only popular because she would beat you up if you didn't kiss her ass. The neighborhood kids breathed a collective sigh of relief when S came of age. Once you turn 18, if you beat up someone younger you go to jail. For about a minute, we all thought we were safe. Then S found people to do her fighting for her. She would go behind the scenes, spreading discontent and lies until it would erupt into violence.
Bitch.
She was the kind of person who would kick you when you're down and aim for your teeth or your uterus. She was one of the few people in this world that I actually pitied... Until she went after my sister.

She told my best friend (coincidentally the most vicious fighter in the neighborhood, after S) that my sister thought she was too good for the neighborhood. Everywhere I went, for weeks, S was chatting with C (my best friend) to the point where I hardly ever talked to her myself. All that time she was feeding the beast named Righteous Indignation. I'm actually surprised C held out as long as she did.
One night, we're sitting on our front porch, and S calls us down to her. It was a cool autumn evening, so of course J was wearing her Lizzies jacket.
We step onto the sidewalk, and see the whole neighborhood bunched up by the entrance to the Game Room. The air was filled with that particular kind of tension that signals a fight. The pack starts to move forward, and I have an internal conversation with myself about the wisdom of running for the house and hoping whatever it is this time blows over. C steps forward from the group and she's wearing her fighting clothes. Shit! This is gonna be bad.
She confronts my sister and starts to point out all the ways J supposedly rubs everyone’s nose in the fact that she's better than them. The jacket is the major bone of contention; J's snootiness is a more minor argument. The rant went something like this, "You walk down the street with your snobby-assed jacket and your nose in the air like you're too good for the world. You think you're better than us? You ain't better than anybody you fucking bitch. You ain't nothin' but trash like the rest of us and I'm gonna put you in your place!"
My sister calmly says, "I wouldn't sully my hands on you."
I started getting really afraid for her then. Before, my primary concern was for the jacket. That was her winter coat, and it was intended to last for four years. I was busy thinking of some way to help buy a new jacket for her, sure that this one was toast. Then she goes and opens her big, fat mouth. I don't know if C had ever heard the term "sully" before, and it certainly pissed her off. Her skin actually got all red and she punched my sister square in the face. I've been punched by C, she hits like a freight train.
I'm shaking with adrenaline and fear, my stomach is all fluttery and it's hard for me to think clearly. Every instinct I have is telling me to run, and there's not one friendly face around. They're all enjoying seeing my sister get her come-uppance. These are the same people she hangs with every day. How could they turn on her so suddenly?
Again my sister states, "I won't hit you. You're not worth the effort."
"Jesus Christ! She is a snob!" I think. C punches her again and almost knocks her down. It was well past time to put a stop to this. One of the mottoes of my neighborhood is "blood is thicker than water" meaning you can hate your family as much as you want in private, but you put your neck on the chopping block to save them in public. I met the guillotine by getting between then and saying, "You have to go through me first." I had hoped that this would bring some sense to her. I hoped in vain. C said, "My fight's not with you, and she's had this commin' for a long time." I replied, "Blood is thicker than water. You have to go through me first." C knows the rules as well as anybody else. She was psyching herself up to hit me when some guy grabbed me and put something cold against the side of my head.
An interesting thing happened then. My fear was gone. There was no nervousness or anger. I thought, "NO." And then I was facing him, staring down the barrel of a tiny little handgun. While my brain was thinking, "You are not allowed to decide (when I die)", my mouth said, "Shoot me, or put it away." I was very calm about this. And I meant it with every fiber of my being. I looked straight into his eyes, calmly expecting death at any moment, not caring, doing nothing but looking into his eyes. I must have stared him down for a whole 2 seconds. During that time, he broke out in a sweat, his eyes flickered to the gun, then to the wall of the Bar, and then he blinked. I knew in that instant that he was not going to shoot me.
He stuffed the gun in his pocket, it was probably unloaded anyway.
He had broken a cardinal rule about neighborhood fighting. You don't bring a gun to a fistfight. When all is said and done, you don't kill a member of your community. We were all in this together, and you don't decrease the numbers. Taking out one person drags the whole neighborhood over that invisible line between decency and scum. You don't bring a gun to a fistfight. Ever. When I turned away from the idiot with the not-so deadly weapon, most of the audience was gone. The rest were standing around chatting like nothing had happened. Some were even approaching my sister to talk with her and express their support for her. They were praising her for boldly standing up to C, and laughing over her soon to be infamous words- "I wouldn't sully my hands on you".
I went and sat in the shadows of my front step and waited for the world to snap back to reality. Ms. Bitch walked away, up the street, her only companion the fool with the gun in his pocket. I found out later that he was her boyfriend, and not from our neighborhood.
C came over and tried to apologize for wanting to beat up my sister, even though she had it coming. I told her she was not allowed to beat up J. If she had a problem with any member of my family, she had best take it to me first, because I'd be watching my sister's back every time.
The up side to it was that my sister escaped relatively unscathed, and her jacket lived to be worn another day.

Public School

When I was young and went to Catholic school, there was never a question about whether I would actually go or not go. School was school. It was the way of the world. Mom went to work and we went to school. Then one day I overheard mom stressing about our tuition payments. It was going to cost $3000 next year, and she wasn't sure she could get enough assistance. This was in the early 80's and Reaganomics hadn't trickled down to our neighborhood yet. The church didn't have much money to pass around to the hundred or so families that used the school.
My sister had chosen her high school when she was in the fifth grade, and was working her butt off to get a scholarship. She took her entire set of textbooks home every night to study. She sweated every detail of every report she had to write. A mediocre grade could mean the difference between St. Elizabeth's High School and public high school. Saint Lizzies was $4000 a year. There was no way mom could pay for that and my education too. So I made a sacrifice and turned it into a "brilliant idea".
I have always had a talent for art, and FAME was a big hit on T.V., so I decided I wanted to go to Visual and Performing Arts public school. I was confident that I was good enough to get in, and going there would ensure my sister's ability to attend St. Elizabeth's. Now, don't get me wrong, I didn't think saving $1500 a year would cover the expense. I fully expected my sister would get at least a partial scholarship, and she had been working part time jobs since she was 12. I really believed that me going to public school would be best for everybody.
The St. Louis City Magnet (read: public) School system sucks. It was intended to promote integration without encouraging black people to move into white neighborhoods. They called this "desegregation", and it was a disaster. In order to get into the magnet school system, I had to take whatever was available, then work my way up the list to the school of my choice. So I left my 20 or so classmates behind and went to Waring Academy of Basic Instruction. Each magnet school had a specialty. Some offered foreign languages, some offered the arts, some specialized in math and science. Waring offered a no-frills education, and two history books. We had history and (I'm not kidding you here) Afro-American history. This was a thick black textbook with silver drawings of people with afro's on it. I asked my teacher why we needed two versions of history segregated by color? Didn't we all live through the same things? In Catholic school, this may have earned me half an hour of kneeling in the corner. At Waring, my teacher told me "because" and kept her eye on me for the rest of the year.
I came to dread the 45 minutes each day we spent with that awful black book. All I learned from it is that history book writers are terribly biased. I started looking for bias in our "white" history book, and I found it. That one was titled "American History" and really was a white book with an eagle and a flag in it. It had 2 paragraphs on the Korean conflict, and referred to Vietnam as an ongoing police action. That's how old this book was. I changed schools in 1981. Our class never made it past the great depression, however, because we opened the white book on Tuesdays and Fridays only. The other 3 days a week were devoted to PE or double math.
At Notre Dame Elementary, lunch was cooked by neighborhood moms who worked in the cafeteria to help pay the tuition for their children. We had a food mom, a milk mom, a money mom and a playground mom. At Waring Academy of Basic instruction, lunch came in a little paper box with no lid. It was served to us by 2 nice ladies with hairnets, and we paid with tickets we had bought Monday morning. You could not go back for seconds and you could not buy extra milk. I would sometimes swipe my mom's cigarettes and trade them for extra food tickets. Apparently our government thought a microwaved chili dog and 5 fat french fries constituted a balanced meal. We never knew what would be served until we smelled it. There was a 6th grader who would sell counterfeit tickets on pizza day. The school tried to outsmart him by changing the colors each week, but he made up food tickets in all 4 colors we used. The lunch ladies didn't care either way. Perhaps they were doing their part to fill the bellies of hungry kids everywhere, and went home happy. I don't know.
Recess was spent on an acre of blacktop with no shade and very little to play with. The school had 5 double dutch ropes and 2 dodge balls. This was our playground equipment. Everyone went out at the same time. Kindergarten through 8th grade spread out across the pavement, the little ones huddled in defensive groups, the big ones running roughshod over them, while the eldest smoked cigarettes on the side of the building. We were sent out in rain or shine. The only time we weren't let out was when there was snow.
It took 2 1/2 years for me to get out of this armpit of education, but I finally reached my dream and went to Visual and Performing Arts Middle School. VAPA middle was like a breath of fresh air after Waring. It was cleaner and rigorous and history was history, not pap about the history of oppression that put you where you are today. My Afro-American history book had 2 chapters on Malcolm X, but only one for Dr. Martin Luther King. Every chapter had something inflammatory in it, and whoever wrote it needs to be publicly flogged.