Dear Leticia

I wrote this eariler today, a compilation of dialogues I have with a neighbor who, to put it lightly, makes her presence known in my building. Never to her face of course.


Dear Leticia:


We live in the same building. I think were worlds apart. I'd guess were around the same age, but you're 3 kids ahead of me. Well 4, as I congratulated you on the front step last night. I judge you, but I'd be judging my mother, who accidentally found herself swollen with the love of my father 4 times by that age. Hmm.

I ask you "where did this come from?" facetiously jabbing your belly, a desperate attempt to converse and connect. I don't know much about the people in my building. With one foot dabbled in the gentrification of Harlem, many of the residents are future relics, in 5-10 years, they will be forced north to Washington Heights, east towards the Bronx, or scattered across Harlem like ashes over the death of what this neighborhood once was. They will be the ones realtors refer to in selling newlywed couples overpriced studios, "this area used to be a rough part of town, but now this area is booming! We just moved a young family upstairs in 3C. Their daughter is probably the same age as your Timmy. I think you'll do just fine here."

Yes, just like that leticia. Building management, just like the rest of new york real estate, want you gone. 3C is where you be, but not for long.

My other foot is planted in this place, this "the hood is where I'm from" place. My rent is publicly subsizied, like yours. We are rent-controlled, every day is the first of the month. We eat the same dirty bodega sandwiches on food stamps. I bet you have a hard time paying your bills on time. Me too, girl, me too. Do you wonder if you will find love? Love that keeps you warm at night and stays through the morning, let alone season.

I do, Leticia, and all these things ring true. I know, I don't know your struggle, and mine may barely scratch the surface of yours. Ill be honest, when you laugh, reasoning "I aint had nothing to do all winter anyway," it hurts. Those were your options? Were those always your options?

I could preach to you better solutions: get a GED, get your degree. Read to your kids more so they're set up for success. Spend less time on the front step and more on the front line. Defend your right to be the baddest bitch-for your hood, for your kids, for your mama Marilyn. Who I saw in the laundromat the other day.

For yourself, which should be enough.

For I took this route, a similiar and am here, in the same building. We probably have regrets, Leticia. Some things we mightve done differently, but wouldn't change them. Shit, I could be making this all up. Maybe you are content with life. You love to grace our front steps with your presence, enhancing the decor with cigarette stench, loud belching, kids running amok (to think of it, I don't exactly know how many kids you have. They could be baby sisters, cousins, kids of friends) and other loud and foul-mouthed banter.


Lemme back up. I'm not prudish. I enjoy a good fuck, shit, motherfucker and can indulge in cocksucker, pussy and nigga. Okay, I'd be hard pressed to use the latter, but I'm not knocking your choice of words. I'm knocking where you choose to use them-specifically outside my window, where if I close them I'm too hot, and well, I'd still hear you anyway.


Yeah. So you probably love your fuckin life, whatever it is you do all damn day. You owe me nothing, but I want to be wrong abt you. Say you're married to a good man. Or that this unborn child has a father, and you cool with him. That you are a team leader at Target. Not that you're good at raising your voice and goin in on the good folks at T-Mobile, or our landlord for asking you to keep it down because he and his wife are tryna enjoy the early summer evening. Or that your vocabulary and range of conversation is limited to Facebook, the hottest phone, who's blowing who, and shit.


If that's good enough for you, then I'm the one with the problem, for you've achieved self-realization. Congratulations.


--me