The Neighborhood

Longing for the past while living in the present, that's nostalgia. It's really a bittersweet feeling, remembering the joy you felt in a moment of your past knowing you can never create it again. Nostalgia always gets me thinking about the past and I often wish I could return some of those moments.

This yearning for the past reminds me  of my favorite childhood book, The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. The Giving Tree is a book that follows the lives of an apple tree and a boy, who develop a relationship with each other. When the boy is young he and the tree are inseparable but as he ages his priorities change and they grow apart. As they grow apart the tree still gives the boy everything he wants from her apples to make money,  to her trunk so he can build a boat. Each time the tree gives the boy something he comes back and asks for more but eventually he comes back and the tree has nothing left to give the boy but a place to sit. “Well,’ said the tree, straightening herself up as much as she could, ‘Well, an old stump is good for sitting and resting. Come, Boy, sit down.” (Silverstein) 

My past reminds me of this story because I think about years ago when our neighborhood  was flourishing. We had successful businesses, it was safe, and best of all we had a community. I remember the block parties we used to have where each house on the block would bring food, we would barbaque, and everyone would spend time together. Loud music would play from someone's car speakers while people danced in their driveways. The older folks would sit back in the lawn chairs with their styrofoam plates filled with food; and we(the kids) would run around from house to house screaming and laughing. Just as the tree gave the boy everything he needed to survive, the neighborhood gave me everything I needed to experience the love, joy, togetherness, and friendship of a community. Which enabled me to have a beautiful childhood. 

Unfortunately, also much like the boy and tree, the community that made my neighborhood what it was grew apart. Somewhere along the way we lost what we once had. Just as the tree lost her trunk my neighborhood lost its sense of community. I look down the street where we used to have block parties and see the same place people ran down shooting. I look at the backyard where my friends and I used to catch fireflies and I see bullet holes. Rather than remembering the joy and togetherness Ive felt in this neighborhood over the years I remember the fear. Fear from remembering when bullets hit my house and I had to curl up in a ball on the floor hoping I didn't get hit. Fear when a bullet flew right above where my brother was sitting on the couch. Instead of thinking of the late nights playing hide n’ go seek and riding our bikes I think about the people Ive met paralyzed by bullets that weren't even meant for them. When I look at my neighborhood I think of the tree stump in the giving tree. Like the tree stump it can never flourish like it once did, it is only a remnant of what it once was. But also like the tree stump, who could no longer offer the old man anything more than a place to sit, this neighborhood –that can no longer offer me a place to create those same childhood memories that fill me with nostalgia– can still offer me a place to sit and reflect on all the good times I had.