Returning…
After seven years, I moved back home to the Bluff City.
I was born and raised in South Memphis with deep roots in Orange Mound. At my great-grandmother’s house, all of my big cousins’ diplomas that hung on the wall were from Melrose or Hamilton. I grew up attending the Hamilton vs. Melrose football games at Crump Stadium and, to this day, I have never seen a golden wildcat. 👀😂
I grew up passing the watermelon man who sat at South Parkway and Willett on my way home from school. I went to Easy Way on Cooper with my aunt, and attended countless graduations at the Coliseum. I saw my first concert, The Scream 2 Tour, there. I know the back roads. I loved going to the Celebration Station and Libertyland. This is home.
Spike Lee’s Crooklyn hits differently for me now. While I lived in Cleveland, I lost my parents and my cousin who used to hook me up with “braids, and beads, and things”.” Grief changed my relationship with the city.
Riding through the city fills me with nostalgia that is sometimes heartbreaking. I feel full and empty at the same time.
I came back to a very different yet familiar Memphis. The Libertyland/Coliseum parking lot is now covered in grass. The last house I lived in with my mother, right off Southern, is dilapidated. I see white people taking leisurely strolls through neighborhoods they used to be afraid to drive through. My old elementary school is closed down. My old middle school now educates K-8th grade. Payne’s BBQ is still standing, and so is Crumpy’s. The church where I gave my life to God is standing strong in the Belt Line.
I never felt unsafe here. The chaotic energy of my hometown is not always wielded correctly, and things can get tricky quickly, but this city taught me hustle. It taught me that laziness is a mindset I didn’t have to adopt. I learned that you may have to demand respect because people will assume that your accent, dialect, and zip code dictate your intellectual abilities.
I’m looking forward to the city reintroducing itself to me. I can’t wait to see what it teaches me as a grown woman ready to get her hands dirty and build here.
I said all that say,
What’s Up, Mane?! I’M HOME!