It’s not like I miss it that much, but it’s the only home I know.

Up on 107th Street

Our block had a catholic church on it with a statue of the Virgin out front.  I went to the adjacent catholic school for a year. Could have been first grade.  My uniform was burgundy and white, I think.  I remember knee-high socks were involved.  Not to mention the nuns and their rulers.

It wasn’t the hairiest block by far––ghetto light vs. ghetto heavy?  One time there was a fire across the street in my friend’s building.  The orange fire seemed to go all the way up to the night sky.

Years later I would read a NY Times article listing my block as one of the worst.  That’s according to the police.  I guess they would know.

Homes where children live exude a pleasant rumpledness,

like a bed made by a child, or a yard littered with balloons.

To be a child again one would need to shed details

till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.

Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,

the heart never goes outside to find something to “do.”

And the house takes on a new face, dignified.

––excperted from “Where Children Live” by Naomi Shihab Nye