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The Neighborhood I Live In!!
Sep. 6th, 2005 08:43 amHi!!!!!!!!!
Still alive. Just been pining for the Shri. Keep meaning to post shit, keep not posting it.
But those who post every day might sometimes find themselves without things to type.
Not me, baby!!
We'll start with the Guy at the Dumpster. His official designation will now be Garbage-Eater.
I was throwing out my trash, trying to clear up the mess I've been making since the lights came back on and I went all narcoleptic, sleeping at the drop of a fucking butt. I come down, and there's this black dude, skinny, wearing a clean white tee-shirt and brand-new jeans, the low-end kind, that still show up bright blue in the stores, you know, unfaded and all that shit. He removes a pastry box from the inside of the dumpster, opens it and inspects the contents, and then proceeds to park his happy ass on the filthy curb and munch on the remains of what appears to be a birthday cake. I approach with eyebrow raised, like, "You're eating garbage. You know this is gross and wrong, right?" He greets me, with a sunny Good Morning, and my expression goes straight to, Uh Yeah. I toss my trash and bail.
The thought hits me that I could come back downstairs with a plate of country-fried steak that I have just finished cooking, and give it to him. This thought is rapidly followed by the cynical thought that he would just eat the fucking cake anyway, and then go for the steak.
There is, by the way, no fucking way that I would invite this gentleman into my home. Rule One of my Florida Probation Plan: know no one. Get involved with nothing. Make noises to frighten off people.
I just the other morning walked a dude to the apartment across the way from me, who was moving in with his mother, after pulling 364 days in County on a probation violation--one that he got thrown out as being bogus, nine months after his arrest. I'll bet he knew someone.
There's also the cynical thought that anyone who is so far fucking out there that they eat a cake out of the fucking garbage might not be the kind of person that someone as fucked as me can help. So the plate stays in the house. I can't teach a fucker to fish, and he already seemed quite happy with his catch for the day. He probably does need help, but it most likely involves Inpatient.
So yeah. Hate me if you need to. But in this 'hood, the head stays down, and shit gets left alone.
Ask![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
shrijani all the manner of shit that she's heard getting said to me in real-time while we talk on the phone, while I'm standing at the bus stop.
So that's my neighborhood. Don't be white here if you can help it, and if you're hispanic, make sure you can fake speaking Spanish if you already don't. It's just the way it is around here. Guys eat cake out of your dumpster and harass you when you won't give them money at the bus stop. Toothless men who wear their skin Dachau-style scream at toddlers, and all you want to do is knock the shit out of them. (Which, by the way, might seem like the right thing to do, but think it through: You're a small black child who knows only one life. Suddenly some thick-tall-crazy white man walks over and slaps the shit out of your Daddy. Knocks him to the ground and starts beating the ever-loving shit out of him. Does Daddy learn? No--he plays the victim when someone asks him. Do you understand? No--all you know is that some crazy white man attacked your Daddy. So, if you want to tear Daddy's drinking black ass a new one, you'd better catch him alone in a neighborhodd that neither of you live in, and make sure his fucked-up ass never gets a look at you. Otherwise, sit still, count to ten, over and over again, and thank God that while your kids might think you are this guy, have no doubt been told you are, at least they haven't known that life at your hands. Turn them over to the DCF, right? One in two children inducted into the Florida Child Care System is sexually abused while they are inside, usually by other children, inside the shelter--and, in my shoes, would they really take my word for it?--so, out of the two tiny kids he's yelling at, the odds are good that at least one of them is going to get molested if you were to turn them in. So, you do nothing. For now. That's what you tell yourself. It's what gets you down the block, gets you through the night, gets you one day closer to a transfer request.)
On a lighter note, my Home-Cooking Experiment was a success: other than a touch too much salt, a tiny tiny amount over the norm, my Southern Fried Steak is the Motherfuckin' Shiznit, and My Gravy Wants to Kill Your Momma. I may have to style myself the Minor God of Grav-ay if this shit keeps up.
And the neighborhood thing ain't all about color. The kid I walked to his mom was of hispanic descent, and the last kid (read as about twenty or so) to fuck around with me on the way to the bus was white.
I don't have to put up with much, most of the time these fuckers satisfy themselves with a little lip, like the guy who drove past me and Neighbor County on the way to our apartment, slowed down, stuck his head out the window, and said, "Y'all hard, ain'tcha?" in a derisive tone.
Yeah chief--real hard. That's why you barked that shit from the safety of your fuckin' car and drove off.
New Orleans. Got nothin' to say. It could have been me, and still can. I sat without power for six days, waded through ankle-deep water on the way to the bus stop (through careful selection and retracing of routes), and watched as three inches of water slid back and forth through the bus that first night, in some spots. I can't help, I can't even leave the fuckin' county without permission asked for well in advance. I haven't got enough money to cover my bills, if I ain't careful this month. Not that my shit means anything to anyone but me.
This coffeeshrijani sent me is Soooooo Fucking Good. It's Roasterie something, like with Don Quixote on it. Not the Peter O'Toole Man of La Mancha stuff, but the Picasso sketch.
So that's me--all over the place.
Fuck it.
Still alive. Just been pining for the Shri. Keep meaning to post shit, keep not posting it.
But those who post every day might sometimes find themselves without things to type.
Not me, baby!!
We'll start with the Guy at the Dumpster. His official designation will now be Garbage-Eater.
I was throwing out my trash, trying to clear up the mess I've been making since the lights came back on and I went all narcoleptic, sleeping at the drop of a fucking butt. I come down, and there's this black dude, skinny, wearing a clean white tee-shirt and brand-new jeans, the low-end kind, that still show up bright blue in the stores, you know, unfaded and all that shit. He removes a pastry box from the inside of the dumpster, opens it and inspects the contents, and then proceeds to park his happy ass on the filthy curb and munch on the remains of what appears to be a birthday cake. I approach with eyebrow raised, like, "You're eating garbage. You know this is gross and wrong, right?" He greets me, with a sunny Good Morning, and my expression goes straight to, Uh Yeah. I toss my trash and bail.
The thought hits me that I could come back downstairs with a plate of country-fried steak that I have just finished cooking, and give it to him. This thought is rapidly followed by the cynical thought that he would just eat the fucking cake anyway, and then go for the steak.
There is, by the way, no fucking way that I would invite this gentleman into my home. Rule One of my Florida Probation Plan: know no one. Get involved with nothing. Make noises to frighten off people.
I just the other morning walked a dude to the apartment across the way from me, who was moving in with his mother, after pulling 364 days in County on a probation violation--one that he got thrown out as being bogus, nine months after his arrest. I'll bet he knew someone.
There's also the cynical thought that anyone who is so far fucking out there that they eat a cake out of the fucking garbage might not be the kind of person that someone as fucked as me can help. So the plate stays in the house. I can't teach a fucker to fish, and he already seemed quite happy with his catch for the day. He probably does need help, but it most likely involves Inpatient.
So yeah. Hate me if you need to. But in this 'hood, the head stays down, and shit gets left alone.
Ask
shrijani all the manner of shit that she's heard getting said to me in real-time while we talk on the phone, while I'm standing at the bus stop.So that's my neighborhood. Don't be white here if you can help it, and if you're hispanic, make sure you can fake speaking Spanish if you already don't. It's just the way it is around here. Guys eat cake out of your dumpster and harass you when you won't give them money at the bus stop. Toothless men who wear their skin Dachau-style scream at toddlers, and all you want to do is knock the shit out of them. (Which, by the way, might seem like the right thing to do, but think it through: You're a small black child who knows only one life. Suddenly some thick-tall-crazy white man walks over and slaps the shit out of your Daddy. Knocks him to the ground and starts beating the ever-loving shit out of him. Does Daddy learn? No--he plays the victim when someone asks him. Do you understand? No--all you know is that some crazy white man attacked your Daddy. So, if you want to tear Daddy's drinking black ass a new one, you'd better catch him alone in a neighborhodd that neither of you live in, and make sure his fucked-up ass never gets a look at you. Otherwise, sit still, count to ten, over and over again, and thank God that while your kids might think you are this guy, have no doubt been told you are, at least they haven't known that life at your hands. Turn them over to the DCF, right? One in two children inducted into the Florida Child Care System is sexually abused while they are inside, usually by other children, inside the shelter--and, in my shoes, would they really take my word for it?--so, out of the two tiny kids he's yelling at, the odds are good that at least one of them is going to get molested if you were to turn them in. So, you do nothing. For now. That's what you tell yourself. It's what gets you down the block, gets you through the night, gets you one day closer to a transfer request.)
On a lighter note, my Home-Cooking Experiment was a success: other than a touch too much salt, a tiny tiny amount over the norm, my Southern Fried Steak is the Motherfuckin' Shiznit, and My Gravy Wants to Kill Your Momma. I may have to style myself the Minor God of Grav-ay if this shit keeps up.
And the neighborhood thing ain't all about color. The kid I walked to his mom was of hispanic descent, and the last kid (read as about twenty or so) to fuck around with me on the way to the bus was white.
I don't have to put up with much, most of the time these fuckers satisfy themselves with a little lip, like the guy who drove past me and Neighbor County on the way to our apartment, slowed down, stuck his head out the window, and said, "Y'all hard, ain'tcha?" in a derisive tone.
Yeah chief--real hard. That's why you barked that shit from the safety of your fuckin' car and drove off.
New Orleans. Got nothin' to say. It could have been me, and still can. I sat without power for six days, waded through ankle-deep water on the way to the bus stop (through careful selection and retracing of routes), and watched as three inches of water slid back and forth through the bus that first night, in some spots. I can't help, I can't even leave the fuckin' county without permission asked for well in advance. I haven't got enough money to cover my bills, if I ain't careful this month. Not that my shit means anything to anyone but me.
This coffee
shrijani sent me is Soooooo Fucking Good. It's Roasterie something, like with Don Quixote on it. Not the Peter O'Toole Man of La Mancha stuff, but the Picasso sketch.So that's me--all over the place.
Fuck it.
