With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo
A Tale of Two Cities
I come from a place in Philadelphia that reminds me of a Charles Dickens book we read in English. The Tale of Two Cities one that’s set in Paris and London during and after the French Revolution. But the place I come from ain’t nowhere close to Europe. I’m from Fairhill. It sounds pretty, don’t it? And for a lot of outsiders, the name is the only pretty thing about it.
Most folks are Puerto Rican. Julio tells me this neighborhood has the highest rate of Puerto Ricans outside of the island. I don’t know why, though. It doesn’t look anything like pictures of the island I’ve seen. Blocks and blocks of two-story row houses, concrete, fenced-in yards, and vacant lots. People have had a lot to say about our neck of the woods, but in general, they should probably keep their neck out our business. This part of North Philly has one of the highest crime rates in the city, or at least that’s what the newspaper reports. They call us part of the Badlands, but when you stay here, you know there’s a lot more goodness than is reported in the news.
Sure, we have gang fights that happen to the soundtrack of gunshots, but we also have dance crews that perform at the summer block parties. We have el Centro de Oro, the strip of Puerto Rican shops where you can get everything from oversized flags to island spices to hand-carved mortar and pestles. We have corner-store owners who hand out candy during Halloween, and the barbershop on the block that keeps a cooler of cold water out front in the summer. We got the rec center where most of us grew up doing our homework, where I received teen-parenting classes and counseling while pregnant, and we got the cultural center a few blocks over that has art workshops, free English lessons, and even brings in live bands for concerts.
Maybe it’s more than just a tale of two cities; it’s a tale of two neighborhoods. On the one hand, people are scared to come over here because they say this part of town is dangerous, “undeveloped,” and a part of me thinks, good, keep out, then. But everyone knows that the good things like farmers’ markets, and updated grocery stores, and consistent trash pickup only happen when outsiders move in. And as much as it seems our neighborhood is forgotten, change is coming. I’ve been seeing more and more construction sites and lots of houses with SOLD signs, and more than ever before white people have been getting off at my train stop, eating at Freddy & Tony’s, wearing their fancy college sweaters and looking like they are nervously making their way home. Home. I come from a place that’s as sweet as the freshest berry, as sour as curdled milk; where we dream of owning mansions and leaving the hood; where we couldn’t imagine having been raised anywhere else. People wonder why I walk so hard, why I smile so rarely at strangers, why I mean mug and carry grit like loose change in my pocket.
And everyone in Philadelphia reps their hood just like me. One of the first things you ask and learn about someone is where they stay. Where we come from leaves its fingerprints all over us, and if you know how to read the signs of a place, you know a little bit more who someone is.
And me? I’m pure Fairhill, but I also got more than one city, one hood inside me. And anyone who wants to get to know me has to know how to appreciate the multiple skylines.