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Hedaa and Arnade write: "That tiny girl who walked into my office, desperate to escape, I think of her everyday when I walk to work. Lily, she wanted to fly away, but her instinct to protect her siblings was too strong."

Children play by a fire hydrant in the South Bronx in New York. (photo: Chris Arnade)
Children play by a fire hydrant in the South Bronx in New York. (photo: Chris Arnade)


How Poverty Steals Childhood Dreams

By Maryann Hedaa, Chris Arnade, Guardian UK

18 November 13

 

Poverty is a thief that steals childhood dreams. You can't expect a kid to excel when they have to raise the rest of their family.

he subway stairs look daunting to Lily. She is carrying two overstuffed shopping bags, a backpack filled with schoolbooks and a basketball. It embarrasses her that she does not own a suitcase.

Lily hopes to find her mother waiting for her at the subway exit, but no one is there. Balancing her belongings, she walks 10 blocks home, alone during the last moments of twilight, listening to every sound and eyeing ever stranger. On Faile Street she lets her guard down. Faile - notorious for open drug deals, gang activity, pimps and prostitutes - is her street in New York. Older women, perched like screech owls on windowsills, watch her from above, providing a small bit of safety.

For 17 years, all the years of her life, she has hoped, and been disappointed, by her mother. Why would today be different?

On Friday afternoons Lily commutes home from a boarding high school, a place for girls who have grown up in high-risk homes. It doesn't get much more high-risk than where Lily lives, the Hunts Point section of New Yorks' South Bronx.

Walking, she remembers Jesse, her mother's current live-in boyfriend, who is abusive and jobless. Jesse's 9-year-old son, Leon, has also moved in. Lily can't let the anger in. She it too tired from the week for that.

She climbs the dark stairwell to the fifth floor of her building and enters an even darker apartment. Her mother, Jesse, and two babies are asleep in the living room. She goes to her own bedroom to check on her three-year-old sister, the one who calls her "mommy". She finds Leon in his underwear on top of her.

Get off of her! What are you doing? She's a baby.

"I'm playing vampire", says Leon. Lily pulls the crying child away from him. There is a hickey on her neck. "That's nasty! Get out of here." Lily shouts for her mother. Silence.

She pulls her little sister close and lies down on the bed. Lily is desperate for sleep but can't stop thinking, "I am so lucky." She remembers Destiny Sanchez, a girl she knew. Destiny was raped and strangled to death. That was under a year ago. She remembers her own boyfriend, Louis, whose throat was slashed with a razor. That was only months ago.

I first met Lily in 2006. I was the principal of a Catholic middle school for girls located in Hunts Point. She walked into my office alone, a thin 9-year-old, "Can I come to this school next year?"

I was stunned by her gumption. The following year she interviewed with her mother, in hopes of becoming one of the 15 girls we would accept.

Lily's mother, Maritza, was 25. A single mother of four children, each with a different last name. The family was living in subsidized housing, receiving welfare. Not much different from most in Hunts Point, where average family income is $16,000.

Academic success needs one stable element in a child's life, and Lily had none. Yet, because of her resilient spirit, I accepted her. I walked to Faile Street to hand deliver Lily's acceptance letter because it's common for people's mailboxes to be broken into as others try to steal welfare and disability checks.

As I walked to Lily's home, mothers with purple-reddish hair and tattoos were sitting in lawn chairs with teen girls at their side, sharing cigarettes as they watched over children playing in the street. An approaching car brought shouts of, "Keep your sorry ass safe."

Lily was on the stoop, babysitting two younger brothers. "Is your mother around?" I asked. "My mother's asleep," said Lily.

For the following seven years, Lily and I watched out for each other. Lily helped me navigate the streets. She told me:

You trust too many people. There are buildings you don't go into. Don't get nosy.

Lily was her mother's confidante. Maritza's stories of being defeated shaped Lily. She heard her talk of eviction and listened to her mother belittle neighbors. Trust no one, was the main message from her mother. Lily was told about her own father, his violent and criminal past. Maritza never let Lily know that he had come back for her. She never told her that he was a well-known trompe l'oeil artist, who created room-sized paintings bursting with Caribbean-colored gardens. Instead Lily grew up feeling abandoned and without pride.

Lily was late her first day of school, embarrassed to be the only girl without her uniform, lunch and school supplies. Crying, she told me about her morning: "I had to wake up the two youngest. I had to wash, dress, and take them to school. My mom just sleeps."

Lily's first day foreshadowed a pattern of tardiness and fatigue. Maritza was a sporadic mother, so by 10, Lily, the oldest child, already carried the burdens of raising a family. She was also absent the first day of summer camp. I called her home phone but it was disconnected, as was her mother's cell phone.

I went to Lily's apartment. Her fifth floor walkup was the last stop before the notorious rooftop, a place to hide a shared gun, shoot up, or have quick sex. The climb to her apartment was unpleasant; the heat and humidity heightened the smells of urine, feces, and bitter wafts of weed. Graffiti reminded children "niggers live here". The fifth floor was quiet. Apartments B, C, and D lacked doors, vandalized and stripped of plumbing and appliances. Floors were scattered with needles. I knocked on the door of 5A. A child's voice whimpered, "We're in here."

A young man in boxer shorts opened the door, a friend of a friend, called in to help. I asked for Maritza. "Maritza's been gone for days." Three children were clinging to Lily, huddled under a tent-like sheet, all in their underwear, crying. The apartment was small, dark and filthy.

Lily was scruffy and tired, asking:

Where is my mother? When is she coming home?

I held back my tears. This is Lily's life. This is how Maritza's children live when no one else is looking. After three days, Maritza did come home. She continually walked a tightrope, standing up just enough not to have her children taken away by the state. She stood up only for emergencies. An eviction notice taped on the door. Lights turned off due to unpaid bills. A court warrant for a suspected child abuse case.

Lily would babysit or accompany Maritza for these crises. One year she missed 36 days of school. As she neared the end of her time with us, I called in favors to get her a high school placement. Her school records showed a downward spiral in grades and attendance, but records never tell the back story of a young girl forced to stand in for an absent mother.

During Lily's freshmen year, her mother gave birth to Angelique, and the boyfriend, Jesse, moved in. Within two years, two more children were born. Lily was now a stand-in, teen mother of six. She missed a lot of high school.

Overwhelmed, Lily crashed. She became depressed, started cutting herself, and withdrew from almost everyone, including me. She still has some fight left. It enabled her to graduate from high school last spring, by the slimmest of margins. We still keep in touch, meeting monthly for lunch. Some days she brings Angelique with her.

I look at Angelique on Lily's knee, bouncing up and down: the vicious cycle begins again. I struggle with the anger I harbor towards Maritza. In hindsight, I wonder if I could have done more.

Lily tells of feeling trapped. She sleeps most of the day, misses appointments, and sits in a lawn chair watching children play in the street.

That tiny girl who walked into my office, desperate to escape, I think of her everyday when I walk to work. Lily, she wanted to fly away, but her instinct to protect her siblings was too strong.


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