Our Anger Corrodes our Neighborhoods

 Women fighting to get on bus. 

Two of my best middle class friends have been working with me on my anger. 

My best friend pointed out to me that in 2008, I dragged some woman out of Giant Eagle for calling me a Racist. 

"Helen," she said sitting on my couch, "You have to stop punching people. "

I had to chuckle because she had me dead to right. 

My other friend Carol, has been working with me on my temper and trying to get me to stop exploding in anger and cussing people out.

My Pastor, a former Drug Dealer and CRIP, has been dealing with my anger and constant fighting. 

My friend Carol pointed that out to me but I was not ready to receive what she was telling me so I got angry at her or made excuses.

I read my timeline and it is filled with angry statuses mainly from my people in my Community and my family. Their posts read like mine: just angry rants. 

The high Violence and Homicide levels in our community are due to many reasons:  Drugs, Gangs,  and the explosive anger of the people who live in these neighborhoods. We may not be able to do much about the drugs and gangs but we can do something about our anger. 

We have to learn different ways to deal with our anger.  I'm in the process of learning different ways to deal with this anger that is bubbling inside of all of us like lava in a volcano.

I'm going to read my Bible and pray.  I'm also working on educating myself. 

The intense rage  is about our Community,  our men/women, racism, the horrible education we received. 

Despite all the issues we have we have to learn to control the fighting and angry arguments  with each other and figure out a way to heal our anger and begin to heal our Community and each other. 

To The Hood Spring Means Death

This Saturday my granddaughter's father lost another cousin to homicide. Big Tone was 31 years old. He and his little brother Trillis used to hang out at my house, several years ago.
Last year Trillis lost his life; he was also shot. Last weekend another young man, Purderty, age 25, was killed in a bar on the South Side of Pittsburgh. He grew up in Hawkins Village and knew my kids.
These three men are by no means the only people I know who have been murdered. I have been dealing with losing people to homicide for 31 years. It never gets easier. It just gets passed down to the next generation.
My adult children in their 20s and 30s have all lost several friends. My granddaughter who is seven has now lost three cousins.
We are tired of it but nothing ever changes because of the no-snitching rules. Little kids are taught that snitches get stitches. People who snitch have been killed. So every spring the Hood USA loses people. Thousands of young men are murdered every year.
People in the Hood often ask themselves: Does the rest of America know what is going on in the Hood? Do they even care?

Different Worlds

On Monday I officially met my best friend Jennifer. I actually met her nine years ago in a Hillary Clinton forum. We became fast friends.

We faced many trials and tribulations together, even though we lived in different Cities. I live in Pittsburgh, PA and she lives in Rochester, NY.

I am a poor, uneducated woman from the Hood and she is a middle-class college professor.

In 2008 someone cut my gas line but no one could tell me who did it or why.
In January of 2009 my water was cut off. No one could tell me why. We lived an entire Winter without water or natural gas.

That Summer, faced with another cold winter, I called Child Protective Services on myself.

They found out why I had no gas lines and water. The houses that held my pipes were going to be torn down. The cost to put pipes in my house would reach $100,000. I couldn't afford that so I had to move.

On September 24, 2009 my teenage daughter and I would be going to a homeless shelter. I was terrified and I told Jen. We were terrified together.

The homeless shelter turned out to be a beautiful four bedroom apartment. Jen spent a sleepless night worried about me and I spent a sleepless night trying to adjust to a new place.

She decided she was going to get her PhD and began applying to schools. She got turned down by her first choice, which devastated her. I was heartbroken for my friend but didn't want her to give up. She applied to another school and got in. Together, we celebrated.

Together, we supported each other through Sarcoidosis and the loss of my spleen, loss of employment due to illness, a missing child, new employment. Jen did my resume on Messenger. My Sarcoidosis moved into Stage 4 and I had to quit my job. Jen had a seizure and then a brain tumor, which needed surgery. We supported each other through each struggle.

We also celebrated the birth of grandchildren, new jobs, and the graduation from high school of my youngest and her oldest child.

What makes us close is that we call each other out on our bull. We do not hold our tongue when the other is making a mistake or in trouble.

I've learned about middle class people and she learned about poor people.

Yes, we come from different worlds but more people should leave their comfort zone and talk to people who are different.

Fetterman takes on Woodland Hills

Mayor John Fetterman, the mayor of Braddock, tweeted at Woodland Hills that they should stop beating up and threateningtheem them up

No the Superintendent and the President of the school board get on TV to criticize the mayor and instead of spending money teaching teachers and Principals to stop calling Children the N word or pepper spraying them because the teachers are to racist and terrified of working with black children. How about we teach white female teachers that little boys in 6th grade aren't rapists.

You can read it here at

://www.wtae.com/article/mayor-fetterman-criticizes-woodland-hills-school-district-for-hiring-pr-firm/987

I've shared my own history of abuse in the Woodland Hills School District here:

http://lifeinurbanamerica.blogspot.com/2017/05/the-culture-of-racism-and-abuse-at.html?m=1

As a long time Resident of Woodland Hills I deserve more than a PR firm lying and covering up the abuse that has been a part of this district since the School District began.

To The People who left both black and white from the ones left behind

I was reading my time line in a group I belong to about my community.

One of the people posted about how she loved North Braddock but she was glad she didn't live here. 

Another commenter said She wouldn't drive through Braddock during the day.

A third referred to the the thugs who live in North Braddock now.

None of these women could understand was they were offending people simply for not being able or not wanting to leave our neighbors.

I get tired of hearing how perfect the community was in the past before the community died.

Back in the day US Steel required it's employees to live in 15104. The black folks had to stay because of segregation. 15104 always had poor people but also had middle class and wealthy people.

In the 70s things changed the mill workers no longer had to live here and black folks didn't have to live here.  They moved out in droves then wonder what happened to their old town.  Somehow it must be our fault despite the fact that the town no longer had their tax dollars.

We survived without you and now we don't want you back.  We remember you were racist and classist.

Then a black middle class woman talking about whites who were gentrifying East Liberty but she ignored the fact that it was middle class black people who were gentrifying poor black people from the Hill and Homewood. 

Guess what black middle class do you really think the black people YOU forced out of their homes and whose lives you ruined.  How very privileged of you to assume because you are black that they love you moving into our neighborhoods.  We do not.  You are no different than the whites who did it.

To the middle class people who left the ghettos and to the ones who are moving in.

We don't want you here.  You don't belong here.  You want to move here fine but be respectful.

We are Poor not Stupid Medical Professionals and how they treat the Poor

402 402 Braddock Ave https://goo.gl/maps/MXgztRhF32A2

My daughter went to pick up my prescriptions for what I thought was my daily medication. My daughter informs me they ordered some sort of laxative.  I never received a call from my doctor telling me anything.

I called the doctor today and asked why I got a laxative and the nurse informed me that my ammonia level in my blood was high. I googled what that meant sure enough it was my liver.

I have Sarcoidosis, an auto immune disease that effects my organs both internal and external.

Why did this doctor do what other doctors who treat the poor do? She could have talked to me and why did she wait two to three weeks to tell me this?

I may be poor but I have great insight into my illness.  I'm poor but I'm not slow and since I've been dealing with this for seven years now I'm used to this type of news.

Medical Professionals need to stop treating the poor like we have no sense.

The Culture of Racism and Abuse at Woodland Hills

The recent National Attention of Police Brutality at Woodland Hills has been an issue I have been dealing with since its inception.

I was a Senior in High School on the First Day of school during the 1981/82 school year.  We were greeted by angry white faces trying to overturn the buses.  We needed the National Guard to calm things done.  We were not given sympathy but told tardiness would not be tolerated here.

Later that year I was informed that I would not be permitted to attend the prom because my skin color did not match my boyfriends.

I was called Nigger so much that I started to think that was my name.

The administration ignored threats by the White Turtle Creek students this was foiled by White kids from General Braddock who went to every classroom to inform the black kids that they were suspended.  They walked General Braddock streets to warn the black Community what was going on.

My children, Jamel and Haley,  had issues that resulted in both of them facing charges.

Jamel was 12 and together with a white boy mad a gun out of paper.  The white boy put the electrical tape. My son was the only one charged.

One day when my child was 17 years old the police brought her to my house her face was battered and bruised.  The police said he was assaulted by my child who did not fight.  He had no marks on his face but she was covered in bruises.

They filed charges against her despite of documented cases of decades of abuse.  A crooked Magistrate forced my daughter to drop out of school by threatening to send her to jail.

The judge didn't realize that Haley has an advocate who has a big mouth and who doesn't forget and she lost a position she really wanted and lost her seat.

Now today I wake up to see Woodland Hills on Good Morning America because finally someone had proof of all the abuse. Finally now maybe the abuse of the Woodland Hills school district will be stopped.

Abuse By Woodland Hills Finally Gets discovered.

Woodland Hills has a long history of racism and abuse that goes back from its inception.

I was a Senior when I was informed that they did not allow interracial couples at the Prom. I called my mom who demanded the Principal pay 18 years of Child support since he thinks he has the right to tell me who I can date.

My own children dealt with racism from teachers. The woman who thought my 12 year old son wanted to rape her.

Then we had the substitute teacher who was so terrified of Black children that she Pepper sprayed them. My own daughter was assaulted by the very same officer who assulted the 14 year old boy.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/pennsylvania/articles/2017-04-06/da-reviewing-after-students-tooth-knocked-out-by-officer

http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2017/04/05/woodland-hills-student-assault-resource-officer/

Woodland Hills forgot not all black kids in Woodland Hills are poor.

Do it for my Granddaughter

On the First Day of Spring my granddaughter Aleara turned 7. She had a small celebration at school and at the After School Center in the Housing Projects she lives in. These were simple like most 1st graders enjoy. A few days prior to her birthday my teacher asked me to write about the day Aleara was born because she was unaware of what other event took place that day. On March 20, 2010 my 21 year old nephew was gunned down on the streets of North Braddock in what the police believe was mistaken identity. Aleara's mom found out about her cousin's death in the hospital where she was awaiting the birth of her daughter. My granddaughter has had to share her birth with an anniversary of a young man's death because to many young men die at hands of other young men for stupid reasons like "He disrespected me". It's never going to stop unless we change things. We got to stop this senseless killings ourselves. My granddaughter Aleara and every other little kid deserves to wake up like her middle class peers not worrying about losing someone else that she loves. Until we stop this violence destroying our Community we risk genocide. "One Hood One Love." Until we start remembering this we are in trouble.

Free Store 15104

Every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday in Braddock is known as Free Store Day.
Founded by Gisele Fetterman, the wife of Mayor John Fetterman.
Gisele is a very positive person who is always ready for a hug and positive word of encouragement to everyone she meets.

I have the honor of being a very good friend of this positive young woman.

Anyone can shop here regardless of income. Everything is free people always donate in large numbers.

The Rules of the Free Store are
      Take only what you need
      Give what you can
      Pay it forward
Recently I was homeless and lost everything.  I relied on the Free Store and Thrift stores to furnish my house and get my clothes back.

I recently realized my Spring Clothes are gone so every week I go to The Free Store and shop. 

In the event of local fires where the people lost everything they are a big help.

The whole idea of not wasting in a world where folks are throwing everything away is refreshing.

It's staffed by volunteers and they are housed  in a shipping Container turned into a nice friendly place. 
      
If your interested in Volunteering or donating to The Free Store here is the information.
   www.freestore15104.org/

The Hours are: Tues 11-1
                           Thurs 11-1
                            Sat 11-1
Address: 446 Braddock Avenue
                 Braddock PA 15104