#bayarebullshitters

[bayarebullshitters-blog]

To Whom The Bay Concerns;

I am a culture clash, I tread between social lines of being “ghetto” or “ratchet” and being “nerdy” or “overly-educated for my own good.” . I’d like to call myself a well-educated person with a well rounded set of street morals. I grew up deep in the hyphy hood roots. My parents gave us our first sheltering in a home on the cross-streets of 23rd and Roosevelt in Richmond, CA. While I was still very young by the time we moved out and into our house on the end of the Dam Road before you reach the looming “better-than-you” air of Orinda, not being able to go and play outside because your complexion didn’t quite match up with the rest of the neighborhoods will always make a kid growing up wondering why being different makes you isolated. My parents were some kind of closed-minded. While they had no outward lying problem with anyone of any race or any type of ethnic background; they didn’t choose to be understanding of people’s difference either. It was expected that I only hang out with the same similar mindset, ethnic background, and moral standing that I was raised to have. In the third grade I brought my first African american friend home to spend the night and watch Harry Potter Movies, My mother just about had a heart attack. She panicked when I wanted to play with the hair and makeup products I was allowed to have. She peeked in every few minutes with the look of dismay that I, her daughter, would ever have a black friend. Let alone invite my black friend to dinner and stay the night with us in our racially mixed household. 

I was always growing up under a canopy of confusion with my own self identity. My Dad is Mexican, his last name is commonly Hispanic last name. And my mom was the primp and proper cheer-leading captain and it read all the way down to her last name.I look a lot like my mom and hold little resemblance to my Hispanic last name but street smart and sarcastic is in my bloodline. My Dad was born in San Francisco, and grew up all up and down the bay in all sorts of different hoods. And the neighborhoods left a heavy mark on his soul that carbon transferred onto me and my brothers. My mom was from Pleasant Hill and moved to Pinole. Her hardest struggle in life was being the youngest of eight and only ever getting hand-me-downs.  She wanted for nothing, and needed for nothing.

My Dad always worked fro everything he’s ever wanted and so have his kids. My mom only sat there and whined because that’s all she ever knew to do when things got hard.

It’s those soft people who move in trying to find the glamourized lifestyles and they get quite the rude awakening when they find out nothing in the bay is what they might of thought it was. I don’t come from a place that’s kind to the soft, we take advantage of the naive and soft ones. This place doesn’t favor the adaptable survivalists. It’s an up hill battle living in the Bay. None of us make enough to enjoy our menial lives and survive on our own. Most of us are cluster fucked together just trying to get by. Everyone is whining about the rate of rent versus the rate of minimum wage, and how no one can afford to live in our beautiful hyphy nation. I think our lives are a lot harder trying to accommodate the comfort of all you spoon-fed mother fuckers. The Bay is live on the backs of the lower wage and all the “Mommy and Daddy Trust Funders” or the “ I was Bred Perfect And Made Perfect Life Choices” millenials are looking at our “fixer upper” streets as a chance to monopolize their kick-starters. 

Nothing about your eco-friendly, cruelty-free, 100% organic, made with vegan fairy dust products belong in a place where men and women used to fear losing their children. Our streets used to command some kind of respect and fear, now I walk around hearing things about how ‘oakland isn’t THAT scary.’ or ‘Richmond is finally starting to turn down.’ I used to be rushed into my home from our minivan because we had a kid that lived down the street recently be released after his gun charges were dropped on a ‘temporary insanity’ charge. We never feared terrorists because the street we lived on was the biggest terrorist in our neighborhood, and anybody who walked up or down it could have been someone who took your life. Now we’re extra sensitive to kids bringing guns from home. When I was in school I remember a kid pulling a shotgun from tucked inside his pant leg like it was nothing and immediately turned around to sell it the the kid next to him while sitting in our English class. A soft generation with soft feelings are finding that it’s that easy to get there hands on weapons of destruction. The Problem isn’t guns in general. The Problem is we left these soft ass niggas think that they run shit. The Problem is these soft whiney little bitch ass kids don’t have hood parents that would beat some sense into their stupid privileged asses like they should have.  The Problem is we left these soft mother fuckers get away with being soft for way too long.

-Yaddah Gold