Though mostly raised in the North Suburbs. I was born and raised in the Austin Neighborhood for a good third of my early life. I have since lived, worked and volunteered in the North Lawndale, Austin and Humboldt Park neighborhoods. That would be the "old" Humboldt Park. I have seen and/or experienced all of the good, the bad and the ugly in the 7th. Volunteering and then working my way up to the position of director of a local homeless shelter and attending university in the 7th, I commuted all over the 7th District, exploring neighboring communities and the diverse cultural offerings while getting to know the people that live and work there.
I enjoyed my African American, European American, Latino, and my Latin American neighbors, their communities, their distinct cultures and most importantly, their issues. I established myself by entrusting myself within those communities simply by enjoying their respective cultures, knowing their issues, and forming life-long friendships. It was not always easy as it was impossible to dismiss the immense disparities, endless injustices, and the bottomless pit of human suffering that exists which is in stark contrast to the North suburbs where I was mostly raised. These interactions have enriched my understanding of the people who live and work in this vibrant part of the city, shaping my commitment to making a positive impact in the lives of those around me.
During my time in Lawndale, I experienced some sort of real life participant observation study. Where it really takes someone from a completely different background to live in and become embedded in a community. Observing, participating and learning about the everyday life of the community, to have the perspective necessary to bring about substantial change, or at least point out such enormous disparities in nearly every aspect of life.
It was not always easy or pretty. Still is never easy. Culturally speaking, delightful. But there needs to be outward societal change to improve not diversity or ethnic culture, but the culture of poverty and the immense disparities in class. For instance to simply provide fresh, healthy food, in these ridiculous food desserts. Or how about simply starting with clean air and water? Safe shelter? The list goes on and on.
I feel that I have gained a unique perspective from my desire to know my neighbors and always had a passion to help the indigent and disenfranchised. How could you not? Where I have a greater sense of what is really going on, apart from the extremes of media representation. Simply by gaining the trust of disenfranchised communities by following and listening. Leading from the very bottom to the top. Allowing for community members to be honest with me as I became increasingly comfortable asking the uncomfortable and difficult questions, because I cared.
Now living through the circumstances of those I previously tried to help, broken by longstanding soulless systems and the heartless bureaucracies through which they operate. To where I am now living through and enduring disability and homelessness (my housing situation even to this day being precarious at best), since I got injured. Enduring cruelty to sociopathic degrees.
Originally, coming from a completely different background, and then living through this, spiraling down the bottomless pit of human suffering, I am not just sympathetic, but fully to my core, empathetic, to what in some cases, entire communities are made to endure.
Through my struggles, I saw and experience first hand, what these communities are made of, what makes them work despite unending challenges; the many different definitions and meanings of the word, “hustle."
Always putting it back into my own perspective of the monstrously shocking, yet blatant inequality that I see. Every. Single. Day.
In a way I was traumatized just even from the stories I heard, what I then saw (some pretty messed up stuff), and to what I eventually am currently enduring. Surviving? Where I never stopped thinking about how to help such communities and historically oppressed groups of people. Putting it into the larger perspective of how, by helping those with the least, can it also benefit those who are in the middle and those who are at the top.
I, like many others, have unique perspective that will benefit all people. I've just been there, even if just for a dabble.
My conclusion: This is not how it is supposed to be.
How about we throw in a little character and idealism, or a lot. Follow that path again.