Leaving the ghetto after 5 years - My experience, and advice ...

This is very similar to a recent move we made. Except it was longer than 5 years and we saved ALOT since we were never in the hole and both have good jobs. We didn't really think of it as the hood we kept to ourselves and kept our house nice which we bought at a bargain 14k in cash back in 2005. I put up a privacy fence and lots of cameras and guns and a very friendly (but mean looking) pit bull. We never were robbed, threatened, or harassed while living there and aside from the drug parties next door and a few drug busts from time to time it wasn't bad place to live. We had lots of great memories in that place, but things got worse recently and we decided to make the move into the country (great school district too). When we went to look at the house the realtor asked if we got pre-approved for a house loan and we said no we plan on paying cash. I think she thought we were wasting her time until about the time we started signing papers. I think she was thinking we were about to get up and be like sike... All in all we got very frustrated at times, but it wasn't like we were dodging bullets and fists. That being said I would never want my kids to go to that school district. I feel bad for any kid trying to learn that has to go there.

I was raised in the peaceful countryside but when I got married I left my parent's home and as we didn't have much money coming in we moved into a trailer park. We lived there 13 long years before being able to move to the countryside. The only thing that helped me make it through all of the dope dealing next door and neighborhood violence and total stress (this was all white trash doing it) was my faith in God and the use of holy anointing oil. I feel that my faith was made stronger by going through all that I did. I just wish it did not take so long to get free!

I think this story shows that in 5 years living in a low income environment One can save money to upgrade so to speak themselves.

Think of all the people living in a Ghetto. Many feel they are trapped and stuck.

I wonder what the difference is?

Finally have closed on land out in the country after living in the ghetto for 5 years, an old mill town that was left to disintegrate after the mills closed. In the late 90s there was a big push for revitalization and a lot of artists and musicians moved into the neighborhood, buying under a special tax rate. Not a bad deal and just a couple miles from downtown where they were opening art galleries and music venues.

The houses are solid, built in the 1930s and earlier, and each has about an eighth of an acre as a yard, deep lots for growing Victory gardens. We have been renting from a friend, a musician who bought in during that great tax break. The first couple years weren’t bad here, and as a writer I enjoyed sitting on the front-screened porch and watching the locals.

Our block has kinda been the unofficial “white” block; the neighbor across the street inherited his house from his mom, and owns several on the block. The neighbors next to him are just good country people who own a couple houses next to each other, and plant in their yard and are often offering excess veggies. The neighbor next door was a hunter, and although he’d clean kill in his front yard, he cleaned up well and would often offer fresh venison, wild hog, turkey, or catfish to us. I also do a lot of things for the neighbors, including rides to the doctor, or work, etc, not to mention feeding a lot of people during the ice storm that left us without power for a week (my gas stove still worked, while most had been shifted to full electric).

Our hunting neighbor, though, after fixing up a house that was probably about to be condemned, moved out and rented to a section 8 family. It was last September and there was a tropical storm moving through the night she moved in. I had the door to the screened-porch open to catch the cool air (our houses are only about 12 feet, if that, from each other), and I heard someone yelling. I stepped on the porch to listen and the woman was having a big rant about how she hated white folk.

It was rather hard to understand her, but I got the gist of it – white folks suck, are horrible, are stupid, of the devil, and should die. She couldn’t see me as I had let the evergreen bushes grow very thick around the porch, but I could certainly hear her. And what she didn’t discover until the next morning was that all of her neighbors were white. Her vehicle had broken down and she sent her daughter (about 8-yr-old) knocking on doors and asking for jumper cables. We helped her that morning, despite what I had heard.

When I saw the owner, I relayed what had been said, but he told me she seemed like a nice woman and besides, she wouldn’t be there long. And if I had a problem let him know – he gave me his number.

A couple weeks later I got a big pup.

In the months since then, transients are in and out of her house, eating from the trash, and pissing in the back yard. I live on a corner, have a privacy fence on the street, but a chain link between us. Over the months she and I have had words, but I think I out-crazied her on New Years Eve when they were throwing fireworks in my yard. They were literally sitting on the porch, lighting shit, and throwing it in my yard.

Anyone with pets know those events are stressful to animals, and we had all the animals inside (except the chickens, lol), and the sheer audacity of them doing that had me out front yelling at them. They have a large back yard, why throw them off in my front yard? Couple big fat women tried to get up in my face, but little, old, crazy me (50ish, 5-feet-tall) evidently had them moving down the street. Yes, I checked my crazy card, and it’s about worn down after five years of living here.

Then I hear our new neighbor as she’s sitting on the porch on the phone and telling whomever that if my big pup barked at her or her friends again she was going to kill it, shoot him. I bowed up, we exchanged heated words as I clarified my dog was doing his freaking job of barking when her “friends” were pissing in the back yard, or peeking over the fence to see what they could steal. She ended with, “Alright, then,” and stepped back in the house, slamming the door.

Her landlord doesn’t answer the phone, and hasn’t since he gave me, and the neighbors, his number.

Then the family across the other street moved out (I live on a corner), and I knew it was going section 8. Across that street is a huge house, with a garage with apartments, and a smaller house behind it. Now there are six or more girls with expensive long braids and too many youngens to count living and screaming over there. My neighbors around here immediately said, “Hope it’s not a brothel.” BTW, somehow they can afford the most expensive cars while we’re driving older, paid off vehicles, and there is a lot of traffic over there, and broken beer bottles outside my privacy fence.

In garage apartment some new folks moved in over the weekend, and what do you do when you move into a new apartment? Evidently poke your big head into the privacy fence across the way. Luckily, my husband saw him and called him out with a mighty “What the fuck are you doing?” The dude ran.

In my time living here, I have tended to at least three accidents – kids on motorbikes running the stop sign and getting hit. I have seen fistfights in the street. Screaming fights in yards that last for hours. Police chases, one of which ended in a fatal accident across the way, harassment from homeless people (I will never help another homeless person who knows where I live), prostitutes being picked up and dropped off outside my living room window, two young gay guys who I assume where about to have sex in the bushes outside my window (checked the crazy card a couple times that day, because what the ever-living-fuck??). Gunshots on a regular basis, and I’ve found gun casings in the yard, sirens all day and night, thumping stereos sitting at the corner after midnight. Neighbors knocking on the door wanting food (but not peanut butter, because they had that in prison and it makes them itchy), cigarettes, or money – like we’re rich (idiots, we live here too), things thrown in the back yard - from utensils, bottles and cans, food items, back packs (roaming bully kid, I guess), and syringes. We have a feral cat problem (some folks I know have fixed over 30 cats, and released them back to the streets), dog packs, wild roaming roosters, and even a pig.

The local (and very corrupt) government is crazy as hell, taxing everything imaginable as the service gets worse and worse, and more people move away. They not only tax rain water (but took forever to fix the sink hole that opened on a major thoroughfare), they are also taxing folks, responsible pet owners, when they get animals spayed or neutered

My advice to those moving into such a neighborhood is be nice, but distant. Don’t befriend anyone, and use that crazy card. I’m sure my new Section 8 neighbors don’t want to mess with the crazy, red-neck (I garden, and have chickens, which is perfectly legal here), woman next door, and I am fine with that. And let them know you are armed.

The next few months will be the hardest as the land is cleared and the construction of the new house, but I see, finally, the quiet and golden light at the end of the tunnel. Thank God!

I’m grateful for the experience as I will have plenty to write about, but I’m thrilled to be leaving.

Finally have closed on land out in the country after living in the ghetto for 5 years, an old mill town that was left to disintegrate after the mills closed. In the late 90s there was a big push for revitalization and a lot of artists and musicians moved into the neighborhood, buying under a special tax rate. Not a bad deal and just a couple miles from downtown where they were opening art galleries and music venues.

The houses are solid, built in the 1930s and earlier, and each has about an eighth of an acre as a yard, deep lots for growing Victory gardens. We have been renting from a friend, a musician who bought in during that great tax break. The first couple years weren’t bad here, and as a writer I enjoyed sitting on the front-screened porch and watching the locals.

Our block has kinda been the unofficial “white” block; the neighbor across the street inherited his house from his mom, and owns several on the block. The neighbors next to him are just good country people who own a couple houses next to each other, and plant in their yard and are often offering excess veggies. The neighbor next door was a hunter, and although he’d clean kill in his front yard, he cleaned up well and would often offer fresh venison, wild hog, turkey, or catfish to us. I also do a lot of things for the neighbors, including rides to the doctor, or work, etc, not to mention feeding a lot of people during the ice storm that left us without power for a week (my gas stove still worked, while most had been shifted to full electric).

Our hunting neighbor, though, after fixing up a house that was probably about to be condemned, moved out and rented to a section 8 family. It was last September and there was a tropical storm moving through the night she moved in. I had the door to the screened-porch open to catch the cool air (our houses are only about 12 feet, if that, from each other), and I heard someone yelling. I stepped on the porch to listen and the woman was having a big rant about how she hated white folk.

It was rather hard to understand her, but I got the gist of it – white folks suck, are horrible, are stupid, of the devil, and should die. She couldn’t see me as I had let the evergreen bushes grow very thick around the porch, but I could certainly hear her. And what she didn’t discover until the next morning was that all of her neighbors were white. Her vehicle had broken down and she sent her daughter (about 8-yr-old) knocking on doors and asking for jumper cables. We helped her that morning, despite what I had heard.

When I saw the owner, I relayed what had been said, but he told me she seemed like a nice woman and besides, she wouldn’t be there long. And if I had a problem let him know – he gave me his number.

A couple weeks later I got a big pup.

In the months since then, transients are in and out of her house, eating from the trash, and pissing in the back yard. I live on a corner, have a privacy fence on the street, but a chain link between us. Over the months she and I have had words, but I think I out-crazied her on New Years Eve when they were throwing fireworks in my yard. They were literally sitting on the porch, lighting shit, and throwing it in my yard.

Anyone with pets know those events are stressful to animals, and we had all the animals inside (except the chickens, lol), and the sheer audacity of them doing that had me out front yelling at them. They have a large back yard, why throw them off in my front yard? Couple big fat women tried to get up in my face, but little, old, crazy me (50ish, 5-feet-tall) evidently had them moving down the street. Yes, I checked my crazy card, and it’s about worn down after five years of living here.

Then I hear our new neighbor as she’s sitting on the porch on the phone and telling whomever that if my big pup barked at her or her friends again she was going to kill it, shoot him. I bowed up, we exchanged heated words as I clarified my dog was doing his freaking job of barking when her “friends” were pissing in the back yard, or peeking over the fence to see what they could steal. She ended with, “Alright, then,” and stepped back in the house, slamming the door.

Her landlord doesn’t answer the phone, and hasn’t since he gave me, and the neighbors, his number.

Then the family across the other street moved out (I live on a corner), and I knew it was going section 8. Across that street is a huge house, with a garage with apartments, and a smaller house behind it. Now there are six or more girls with expensive long braids and too many youngens to count living and screaming over there. My neighbors around here immediately said, “Hope it’s not a brothel.” BTW, somehow they can afford the most expensive cars while we’re driving older, paid off vehicles, and there is a lot of traffic over there, and broken beer bottles outside my privacy fence.

In garage apartment some new folks moved in over the weekend, and what do you do when you move into a new apartment? Evidently poke your big head into the privacy fence across the way. Luckily, my husband saw him and called him out with a mighty “What the fuck are you doing?” The dude ran.

In my time living here, I have tended to at least three accidents – kids on motorbikes running the stop sign and getting hit. I have seen fistfights in the street. Screaming fights in yards that last for hours. Police chases, one of which ended in a fatal accident across the way, harassment from homeless people (I will never help another homeless person who knows where I live), prostitutes being picked up and dropped off outside my living room window, two young gay guys who I assume where about to have sex in the bushes outside my window (checked the crazy card a couple times that day, because what the ever-living-fuck??). Gunshots on a regular basis, and I’ve found gun casings in the yard, sirens all day and night, thumping stereos sitting at the corner after midnight. Neighbors knocking on the door wanting food (but not peanut butter, because they had that in prison and it makes them itchy), cigarettes, or money – like we’re rich (idiots, we live here too), things thrown in the back yard - from utensils, bottles and cans, food items, back packs (roaming bully kid, I guess), and syringes. We have a feral cat problem (some folks I know have fixed over 30 cats, and released them back to the streets), dog packs, wild roaming roosters, and even a pig.

The local (and very corrupt) government is crazy as hell, taxing everything imaginable as the service gets worse and worse, and more people move away. They not only tax rain water (but took forever to fix the sink hole that opened on a major thoroughfare), they are also taxing folks, responsible pet owners, when they get animals spayed or neutered

My advice to those moving into such a neighborhood is be nice, but distant. Don’t befriend anyone, and use that crazy card. I’m sure my new Section 8 neighbors don’t want to mess with the crazy, red-neck (I garden, and have chickens, which is perfectly legal here), woman next door, and I am fine with that. And let them know you are armed.

The next few months will be the hardest as the land is cleared and the construction of the new house, but I see, finally, the quiet and golden light at the end of the tunnel. Thank God!

I’m grateful for the experience as I will have plenty to write about, but I’m thrilled to be leaving.

Quit moaning.

If you spent more time sticking ur nose out of other people's business. You might have had a better time.

It's you. Your next place will no doubt be full of drama.

Get laid.

Congrats on your new land op !
If memory serves you were in the neighborhood where the latest snowflake leaker lottery winner or something lived lol

Glad you are moving out of there and even though it was probably less than pleasant you paid off bills and saved money which is awesome!
Maybe you gathered some writing inspiration from your 5 years in exile
After moving around (Carolina,right?) I find music is well written with life experience so hopefully your writing is inspired by life too but I can't remember what you said you write at the moment.

Anyway glad it all worked out well !
Patriotinwaiting

I think this story shows that in 5 years living in a low income environment One can save money to upgrade so to speak themselves.

Think of all the people living in a Ghetto. Many feel they are trapped and stuck.

I wonder what the difference is?

Quit moaning.

If you spent more time sticking ur nose out of other people's business. You might have had a better time.

It's you. Your next place will no doubt be full of drama.

Get laid.

Yep. When I bought my first place for cash, sellers realtor didn't believe I could do it (I am a frumpy, not good looking female that doesn't look like she has money)...until I gave copies of my bank statements. I had plenty left over for the sale. I was more than qualified in that department

CASH IS KING.

I bought a place, that time, that was also paid off. Amazing...how little fees and crap that doesn't take place when a place is paid off...and you are buying it for cash.

LMAO. You could've got a mortgage for 3% over the past 6-8 years and made 4X the return on your "KING CASH" in several investment vehicles.

We live in an area called Harrisburg, in Georgia. One day my husband came home and asked me about my day ... the song he wrote is basically recreating my day (I love when he does that, lol), and the video below gives an actual view of our neighborhood.

"Not Even Pennsylvania" is the title, cuz we've traveled through Pennsylvania, slept there half-a-dozen times, on our way to New England from Georgia, and it's a pretty weird state, comparatively.

BTW - he's a far better drummer than I ever was

I especially liked "expensive long braids". Were the price tags still dangling?

Because everyone in the ghetto pays full salon price for everything and no ghetto dweller would ever braid hair off books or without a license, this skill being impossible to learn outside of cosmetology school or to perform outside of a licensed salon.

I'm glad youre getting out of that horrid place and hope you have many happy peaceful years in the country.

good song!

Thanks so much, now you know why I'm ornery sometimes

I will also admit living in the ghetto helped us pay off our bills and save money toward our dream.