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Featuring: Carol Roach

winterose@videotron.ca

Out of the Ghetto Good Things Must Come
by Carol Roach

The harsh reality of Ghetto life produces attitudes that are quite unfamiliar to middle class people. These attitudes are viewed as defeatist and are actually transferred upon the ghetto dweller so that they appear to be lazy, always looking for a hand out and most importantly refusing to work. What the middle class person does not understand is that these attitudes come from years of being rejected, years of struggling and never getting a head, years of finally internalizes that you are useless and unable to do anything and even if you try you will NOT be given a break anyhow.

Much research is being done in this area and psychologists are starting to understand the psychology of poverty. For example, middle class parents instil in their children from the onset that when they get a good education and when they work hard enough they will indeed succeed in any career path of their choice. This ideal is hardly ever questioned as it is a given in most cases especially if the children will be in a position to take over their parents company, become a partner in a firm, or follow the tradition handed down to the them as they come from a family of doctors or military etc.

The poor have a tradition to live up to as well. They have the tradition of being on welfare. They have the tradition of never completing a good education because they have no resources available to them. They have the tradition of knowing that even if they do strive to work hard, who will hire them with such limited skills anyhow.

In my ghetto community families struggled all the time to survive. There was a glimmer of hope if you were white but if you were black like the majority of the community that hope was taking away from you. You had to battle the additional reality of racism in the work place.
I have just painted a picture of just about any ghetto reality in America, but remember I am from Quebec, and we had yet another hardship to overcome which is how to be English speaking in a French environment? This aspect alone levels the playing field for all ghetto dwellers alike. In the rare occasion that a black person could speak French and I do mean rare they did indeed obtain gainful employment before a white person.

Looking at the harsh reality of ghetto life it is no wonder that psychologists found attitude differences among ghetto and middle class communities. Middle class children grew up looking towards the future as something they could create for themselves and make as good as they wanted it to be. Poor children grew up first wondering if they would grow up at all or be shot in a gang fight before they reached the age of majority.

The other reality was how to survive on a day to day basis rather than even dream about the future. Poor high school students live with the reality of watching their parents struggle day in and day out to put food on the table and most of the time that food does not stretch far enough. Many a young child and high school student alike have gone to school hungry because there was not even a slice of bread in house for them to take with them.

Again psychologists have found that children do not perform well in school on an empty stomach. So put all these factors together and you have that the poor do not dream of the future being in their control as their middle class counterparts do. The poor are more concerned with the immediate concerns of staying alive and putting food on their tables. They do not perform well in school because of being hungry much of the time. This in turn hinders their ability to graduate and puts them in a position that will limit their ability to find work. Their main interest of surviving on a here and now basis is far removed from the middle class ideology that a good education will bring a good future.

An education holds little hope for the poor. They do not see how the school system can teach them the lessons about getting a job be it any job in an all too tough world. Studies have shown that grade 9 is a crucial point in ghetto schools. Most of the drop outs happen at this time. It is also the time that ghetto children question their reality and they find it wanting indeed. They have no dreams! Even if they finish high school a university education is so far removed and out of reach that most don’t even bother to inquire how it could become possible. Dreaming about a future does not cut it. The ability to put food on the table the fastest way possible today not in the future is their reality and theirs alone.

The high school dropout does not see where learning about our political system would ever get them a job in politics, or how learning about the human anatomy would ever help them become a doctor. These options just don’t exist for poor ghetto kids and if they happen to be black and English speaking only like here in Quebec, well they just don’t see themselves growing up and being gainfully employed anywhere, anyway, and anyhow. These youth are so demoralized and angry that they fight back the only way they know how. They quit school, loaf around, grow up to continue the tradition of being a welfare family as their parents before them and or they turn to a life of crime.

For example, after I had left the ghetto to get married I would consult with Lavenia who remained behind and she would let me know what was happening in the community since I had left. One day we went through the list of all the people we had known in elementary school and what became of them. The results were shocking even for us. Just about every black girl we knew with the exception of one or two was or had been a prostitute while many of the black boys became pimps. There was a large majority of black and white boys alike who were then or had been in jail for robbery and other charges. The vicious cycle of poverty continues for yet another generation and this being the only future that the poor can look forward to so they reason and so they live their lives.

To be continued from Part I

Having said that all was not lost in my ghetto community though we did not express much pride outside of the community where we were often made to feel embarrassed, we did show whatever pride we could within the community.

My maiden name is Buckingham and although I hated it when I was in high school because the kids would always tease me about it I also loved it because it meant royalty. Somehow I was associated with Buckingham Palace. Somehow my ancestors had some social standing and perhaps just perhaps I was related to the Duke of Buckingham himself!

Similarly when my grandmother remarried she married a man named Bob Menzies. He was related to the Menzies family in Scotland. The Menzies castle still remains in Scotland. Many years before Bob met my grandmother and moved to the ghetto to live with her he was contacted by the Menzies estate on two occasions. The first time he was asked to contribute to the rebuilding of the castle. The second time he was told he was one of the heirs to the estate. He was told to contact their attorney to find out what his share would be.

Unlike me, a teenager, who was experiencing delusions of grandeur at the time, Bob was an adult who knew all to well that he was so far removed from this family that he never heard of. His share could not be anything worthwhile especially since they had previously contacted him to help restore the castle. He never bothered to contact their lawyer. I continued to rejoice in the fact that Bob was a celebrity of sorts - if only in my mind!

Never the less, the community prided on the fact that they knew or were related to a celebrity. We did rejoice in the fact that some people actually got out of the ghetto and did something good with their lives. Working class people in our neighbourhood already felt that they reached the pinnacle of high society just by virtue of the fact that they had a job. They felt they were better than non-working people even if theirs was a minimum wage job. The non-working people only knew by association or had a family member who made it out of the ghetto and they would talk about it at every given opportunity available to them.

My grandmother would often tell me that she used to go skating with a young man in her youth. He was very much attracted to her. She never saw him as anything other than a skating friend, but maybe she should of. Because he grew up, left the ghetto, and became the mayor of another city! To ghetto people Ernest Crapeau may as well been a king - the Mayor of a city was something so far removed from the life we lived it was almost a position of royalty in and of itself to poor people like us!

The older generation remembered the legendary Oscar Peterson, world renowned jazz pianist. My grandmother took pride in the fact that his backyard and hers were face to face and she actually got to see him go in and out of his apartment when he was young and struggling before he made it to the big time.

The old people would also talk about how Sammy Davis Jr. had one time lived on Torrance Street with his uncle long before he moved to the states and hit the big time. By the time I was old enough to visit the street for myself, it no longer existed. It was torn down to make way for a highway. But it was something that I could always cherish as a good ghetto memory even if I would never see the street for myself.

My grandmother and I met the wife of Percy Rodriquez, the actor. The wife came to the house with another of my grandmothers friends. She still lived in Montreal, while her husband resided in Hollywood to pursue his career.

My grandmother and I even met an infamous character. Alvin Carpus known to all as “old creepy”, a 1930’s gangster came to live in Montreal after he was released from Alcatraz. He too came to the house and was introduced to her by friends. This story she did not tell others because she was afraid of him. I on the hand being a young girl felt he was a celebrity - a real gangster of the past! Anyhow he could no longer hurt anybody he was an old man who just wanted to live the rest of his years out in freedom and obscurity.

Two of my elementary school friends, Terry and Robin were twins. They were also adopted. Terry carried onto the dream that though their real mother was a check out girl in a night club their father was Mohammed Ali. They carried that belief around with them for as long as I can remember. Terry said that Mohammed had come to Montreal one night and met his real mother. She was young and single and pretty and one thing led to another resulting in the twins being conceived that night. Since he never contacted his real mother there was not much chance of verifying the story for its validity but never the less it served as a dream - a thought that this ghetto child was the son of a celebrity. Terry was so inspired by this dream that he aspired to be a boxer himself and trained for boxing at the time as well.

When I was 14 years old I chased after a boy for an entire year. I was so taken by Kim. I thought he was the greatest thing since sliced bread. He never paid any attention to me at all. I was at his house every single day but most of the time he was out probably on purpose to avoid me no doubt. His brothers were always there so I did get to have a good time anyhow. In fact what happened was that his brother, Blair ended up having a crush on me but I had eyes only for my Kim! Even Blair got tired of waiting for me before I got tired of waiting for Kim and he ended up having a steamy encounter or two with my friend Renee before she moved to the states to live. The Sherwood family was a very talented family indeed. The older brother Tony became a movie star. He was gorgeous. I did get to meet him once or twice while he still lived at home. Kim, his brothers, and sisters started their own musical group and went on tour. I too did know a celebrity or two!

If you remember from my other stories about Dee, she was a childhood friend who became my mentor at university. She also became a local celebrity. She is a Black Historian, in other words a Black woman who is an authority on the history of Blacks in Montreal. Dee is one celebrity that I am proud to say that I know!

The buck did not stop with me and thank God for that. One of the things that are important to young black boys in the ghetto here in Montreal is their ability to excel in sports. Many a black boy including my own son dreamed of being the next Michael Jordan or sports player of the day.

One young man just slightly older than my son did make it. Tommy Cain excelled at football. He was actually discovered by a talent scout who came to Montreal. Tommy was offered a scholarship to an American university and latter played for Seattle. For years the community raved at the accomplishments of their wonder boy! He became the dream that little black boys could now hold on to. He became that reality that good things could actually come out of the ghetto and there really could be a future for even the poorest black child.

Carol Roach
winterose@videotron.ca

Carol Roach is a published writer and newsletter editor. You can purchase her book: Picking Up The Pieces: A Woman's Journey at www.publishamerica.com, or www.amazon.com. You can also go to your local bookstore and order it there as well. If you are interested in other stories feel free to join her newsletter: Storytime Tapestry at: storytime_tapestry-subscribe@yahoogroups.com, or email her directly at winterose@videtron.ca and she will be glad to accomodate you. Carol enjoys email and responds to every inquiry.

 

 

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