Racism

I grew up in South St. Louis. There was a lot of fear and anger directed toward the African Americans in the North and Central parts of town. The neighborhood was overwhelmingly Catholic, and ethnically Irish, Italian, German.

In the 60s and 70s, it would be fair to say that racism was casually practiced, and the N-word was used in polite conversation to approving nods and enthusiastic giggles. As a child, you never know what history might have led to this, (definitely a subject of another post) but I found the hatred aimed at African-Americans bewildering. I took some bullying and taunting because of it. Yet, there was one weakness I had, and that was jokes. My childhood was tough, and I was willing to laugh at anything, including jokes directed toward me. I had a too-well-developed sense of irony as a kid.

We didn't see African-Americans that often. Yes, I heard that so-and-so friend went to North St. Louis and got jumped, but we seldom saw them in our neighborhood. When they came down, they were just as likely to get beaten or harassed as any white kid in a north city neighborhood, except I think, the police would be far less helpful to the victim.

People complain about "political correctness," but if my memory serves, in the absence of African-Americans, racism was constantly refreshed and reinforced through jokes. Yes, whoever could tell the grossest, coldest, racist joke was pretty certain to have some status in the short-term. The way you hate n** was a reliable conversation piece. It sometimes turned my stomach.


The Catholic nuns who taught me deserve criticism in many ways, but I'll give them credit for this: they did really try to teach tolerance in their own heavy-handed way. We had a particular nun who would rant against it. They took us on a field trip to see "Sounder" staring Cecily Tyson.  (The priests now . . . that's for a different post.)

Unfortunately, among my peers as they reached adolescence, tolerance became something to rebel against, even though the source of the racism was the parents. I think that the same people who rebelled against tolerance are the ones who now have more subtle complaints against "political correctness." I guess the jokes are just too good to give up. For a teenager, often times something doesn't need to rebellious, it just has to look that way. The cigarette companies have made a fortune off that.

 

Moving Hell

For the work that I've done, I haven't got a lot to show for it. The only things I've been able to do so far is buy and move cleaning supplies in, find places to put them and add some extra lighting. Hard to believe that seems to have taken up two days. Of course, delays due to the lock and gas emergency led to some of it. I did get diverted today to looking at the neighborhood's famous open-air market. I bought lunch for three dollars, a bowl of rice and beans. It's a wonderful neighborhood to walk in with plenty of houses similar to the French Quarter in New Orleans, except in brick. Once I'm settled, hopefully before it gets cold, I should have fun just walking it and taking pictures.

I didn't realize how similar these houses were to dreams I've always had. It comes from my grandmother's old neighborhood, where huge spectacular houses of this style, practically mansions in their day, were abandoned, neglected and left to decay. It's the setting in my horror story Wil-o'-wisp. These, however, are mostly the idealized version of that architectural stereotype. As I post pictures, and I will soon, you'll see the idealized and the nightmare version.

The houses on my grandmother's street were mansions by 1860s standards. Unfortunately, after the Civil War, people began to abandon St. Louis. The city had already peaked, in population and importance, by the 1870s. After that, came Kirkwood, which was the first commuter suburb.The wealthy began to abandon Park Avenue near downtown for Kirkwood, the first community of its kind, and other suburbs like it. So, Park Avenue became the poor neighborhood. When it came time to set up public housing, they placed one of the biggest projects, the Darst-Webbe-Peabody project, right on Park & 12th (Tucker).

For me, though, I'm living in a cheap, decent apartment in Soulard, a great old neighborhood. The ghetto spot in the ritzy district. Despite all the troubles I've been having, it's well worth the wait, and I don't think I could have done better.