|
I grew up in Cleveland, OH. Although my mother was a nurse and my father was a cop ... I was 10 years old before I actually had a conversation with someone non-Black, and then it was a door to door insurance salesman that my mother wouldn't let in the door.
I just a (not so) quick story to share ...
After graduating from college, I returned to Cleveland. I had a "good" job and could afford to live anywhere in the city I wanted; but I purchased a run-down two-family in the Central neighborhood (two blocks from where my father grew up). The neighborhood was completely run-down and my house was bordered on 3 sides by PJs.
All of my friends thought I had lost my mind. I told them that I had made a conscious choice to live where I did because I wanted to have an impact on our community. They told me about all their philantrophic events, like Big Brother/Big Sister and the church tutoring programs that they were involved in. And told them that's great, but I wanted to be a day to day role model. Most of my friends countered that they were role models ... They were showing the kids that if they worked hard, they too could have a house on the hill. I offered that just as these kids saw them on Saturday mornings at the programs, these same kids saw them leaving their world at the end of the session ... before dark. So they weren't really showing them what they could have if they worked hard, rather they were showing the kids what they could have if they had money ... and these kids already knew how to get money, they lived around hustlers 24/7.
Some of my friends accepted what I said; others got offended and never spoke to me again.
Well, one Saturday morning, I was out cutting the grass and picking up trash on my lot (and the two lots on either side of my house). It was a hot day and I was just about spent, when a couple of neighborhood kids (Jr High aged) came walking by. I asked them if the wanted to make a couple of dollars. They looked at me and asked what they'd have to do? I told them I needed help finishing cleaning up. I offered them $25.00 each. They took the money and got right to work. We finished about 6:00p.m., so I fired up the grill and cooked some burgers and we all ate on my porch. While we ate, we got to talking about nothing of any importance, just stuff. I didn't ask them their names and they didn't ask me mine.
The next weekend, I was out doing more yard work, and those two man-childs happened by again. I was just about finished with the work, but I noticed them slow down and look at me as they came to my house. Again, I asked them if they wanted to make some money. Again, they asked what they had to do. I told them I needed the tree lawn cut. They agreed and cut the tree lawn and (without being asked or told) picked up some paper that accumulated on one of the lots next to my house. Again, I fired up the grill and threw on some hotlinks and we ate. And, again we talked on my porch.
The following Saturday, I was out doing yard work and this time the two kids came by ... with 3 other kids. Again, we did our ritual, but I decided that this was an opportunity. Instead of random talking, I guided the conversation. We still talked about girls, the lastest dances and what-not, but I started talking with them about school, Black History, and politics; but I ended each session with a discussion about the fact that their future was based on the decisions that they made each and everyday.
By the end of the summer, I could be found each Saturday evening with between 5 and 15 youth sitting on my porch, eating and talking ... the two original kids and a bunch of others.
This continued until school started. I encouraged them to bring their books so that when we were talking, I would help them with their homework. When the weather changed and it was too cold to be outside, I invited them into my home. I never had a problem with these kids (I think they were self-policing) ... and amazingly, I never had another break-in. In fact, I began to notice that when I was at the neighborhood grocery store, people seemed to treat me a little differently, as if they knew me.
This continued through the Christmas break. But after school started, I noticed that the two original kids stopped coming around. At the sessions, I asked about them and was told that one of the kids had been sent up to juvenile; but no one knew where the other kid was.
By this point, the sessions had out grown my house and I was getting older kids coming around, so I moved the sessions to the dayrooms of the PJs ... each Saturday, we met in a different PJ. We continued to talk and do homework and all ... I even got some of my Fraternity Brothers to help out because there were just too many kids for me to deal with myself.
Then, one day at the end of the school year, I got a knock at my door. It was the missing original kid. I invited him in and asked how he was doing; I had not seen him in a while. He told me "Mister (we still had not exchanged names) ... I just want to thank you." He told me that although he did not know what I did for a living, he knew that I had a nice car and had done a lot with the house AND he knew that I got up every morning and went to work and arrived home sometimes late at night. He said that he knew a lot of hustlers that had a lot of money, so he knew how to get money; but none of them had any peace in their lives.
He, then, told me that he and his buddy (the other original kid) were holding drugs for one of the neighborhood dope boys. When his buddy got busted (and the dope boy let him take the fall), he decided that he wanted something different for his self. He told me that as a result of the Saturday talks, he began to understand what I was talking about ... that he did not have to hustle to get the things that he wanted and most of the things that huslting got you didn't last very long.
So he said he buckled down in school and one of his teachers noticed. The teacher hooked him up with a counselor and the counselor hooked him up with the A Better Chance Program. (This program provides promising, but at-risk youth, the opportunity to attend various Prep School around the country). This kid had disappeared because he was attending a Friendship School in PA.
Not long after this, I took a job in Arizona and the sessions died on the vine; but I have great faith that that one kid made it ... and that made my golfingless Saturdays worthwhile.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
