Fulton Street Mansion

e moved from North Carolina to keep from totally being in the streets, after all what is a 52 year old woman suppose to do?  I had already sent my crazy brother and half insane mother ahead, via plane, a few days ago. I drove with my daughter in a rented truck loaded to the gills with personal treasure.  My feet and legs were three times their size.  I could barely walk or sit because I was so swollen and I was holding the cat (our Siamese Chocolate Point) the entire time.

    It took me two days to get from North Carolina to Houston, Texas.  I was a little scared about returning to a city I had grown up in. Coming down Interstate 10, I saw the crystal palaces from my past. They were bright and shining. Each chimney going full force on this cool December evening as the sun went down in the far western sky. The crystal palace is where the Dorothy went to see the wizard with her friends to try and get home. In actuality, the crystal palaces are chemical plants. I could not find many of the old landmarks that were once on this road into the big city. I saw many houses on the other side of my palaces though. I knew the population had grown but to this extent. There was so much that I could not find.  Mother had told me on the phone, the previous night, “Beware of your emotions.”  I saw what she was talking about. The Houston I knew was gone. I have accepted as much and kept my council to myself.  I looked and stared, slowing my driving speed.  I could not find my blimp. Where was it?
You can’t ever go back. This I know from a life time of living and moving with my parents. They were forever trying to recapture a time of their youth—those pleasant memories in a time of utter lunacy. I kept thinking that it had been more than ten years since I laid eyes on this city.  In truth it had been more like twenty-five years. My Houston was in my heart, never to surface again.

    As we left Interstate 10 and went north on Interstate 45, I looked intently for the correct exit. I was now on Fulton looking for the house where my niece, great nephews, brother and mother were at. After about 30 minutes, we finally arrived. I had to wade through rail construction and look for young boys playing in the street directly across from Moody Park. When we pulled up into the yard and turned the engine off on the moving truck, my daughter and I sat there. We were not speaking at each other. It was as if we knew what each of us understood what the other was thinking.

“What have I gotten myself into?”

   In front of us were three poor pitiful excuses of shacks. They were not houses, they were shacks. They were putridly painted vomit brown, crooked hanging eaves over the front doors, dirt yards, crab grass patches, weeds, rotten wood, and hanging gutters of remnants of three whore houses that were abandoned during the depression that are now leftover shacks for left over people. I had to question my own intentions of why I was here. Am I a left over person?  What did I get myself and my daughter into? Before I got out of the truck, I said a prayer for protection, for strength, and for perseverance.

    Now in my life time, I have made some pretty dumb decisions. After all isn’t that the very essence of living is to fall down, get back up and try to go on with life.  We live from our mistakes. I began to formulate a game plan as I walked into the first shack on the right. This is the residence of where my family was. I walked in and immediately had to sit down again. The inside was almost a worse as the outside. There was dark dust and dirt on the walls and ceiling. There was one chair, clothes everywhere and a Christmas tree in the corner. There was a brand new television, x box, and what looked like an entanglement of black snakes attached to cable equipment. Sheets were over the threshold of each door except the bathroom—a real door. I counted numerous holes in the wall and pencil markings of various messages. Mom looked at me and said, “Take a deep breath. I told you to beware of your emotions.”

I was in hell! Had I been such a bad person turning my life around all these years and for graduating from college with a degree to come and finally get a job to support my family? Is this the price I am to pay, to live in a shack? Okay. If this is what God wants, to see how I make it, then so be it. I am up for the challenge! One of the biggest adventures I have been given from God is to see my dear sweet friend from years past, Donna on Christmas Eve. I have not seen Donna since 1986. I lost touch with her because of reasons I no longer remember. We went our separate ways, had families, and continued to live, missing each other as we became older in life.  Her grandmother, whom I thought the world of, eventually died over time. Her father was now living in that house off of Airline Drive. Mr. Peg was gone too. (He was the old man who owned the gas station on the corner of Airline and Little York.) The buildings I once knew in the area were all gone. There were a lot of ghosts that walk the streets. The majority of my ghosts were men. I was concerned with one man in particular, Joe.  I lived with Joe and cared for him but I did not love him. My niece’s house on Fulton was not far from the house he lived over in the Heights. It took me a whole five minutes to locate him. He was dead. I breathed easy. I was dreading about what we would say to each other if I were to run into him.  We did not part on a good note.

Then there was Milton. A good man but I did not know it at the time; I was too dumb and young. He was tall, redheaded, and handsome. He always smelled so good and in private, we will not mention that except he was a wonderful, caring, and loving man.   I blew it with him. Well, too little too late. Sometimes things can never be corrected. You can’t go back and build on something that you probably have made more tender and sweet that it really was.

While waiting for Donna to pick us on Christmas Eve, my adult children and I decided to walk across the street to Moody Park and look around and wait there. It was cool outside and there was a light drizzle, but it sure did feel good. While sitting on the concrete wall, an oddly looking man walked up to us. He reeked to the heavens of soiled clothes and lack of personal hygiene to a point. If I were a bar of soap and saw him coming toward the tub, I would run stick myself in some drain in hopes of melting quickly. He approached and stopped to stare and smile at my son. When this odd fellow smiled, he had a mouth of black rotted teeth, probably from years of narcotic use and lack or oral hygiene. He tried to get eye contact with my son (who was 22) at the time. My son backed away and he got closer. That is when “Mom to the rescue” stepped between them.
   
      “May I help you?” I asked.

      “No. I was just admiring your man.” He replied

      “That is my son, he ain’t buying! Get lost.” I told him sternly with walking stick in hand.

    The odd man turned and kept on walking. The man wanted my son to pay for his services. Unfortunately my son had never encountered something like this and didn’t recognize the attempt. I did tell him what the man wanted. Robert turned 50 shades of “beet red.” Telling me not to tell anyone, every what had happened that day! (But you know Moms love to tell secrets and funny incidents about their children.)

    Later on Christmas Eve, Donna, her husband, and her daughter came and picked us up.  I had a great time with her Dad, Dad’s life long live in---that he will never marry, brother, sister in law, husband, son, and daughter. It is interesting hearing about me and I didn’t even realize that I was that wild and crazy. My own children couldn’t believe that their mother was a major party animal. I just sat and listened why my kids swapped stories with Donna and her brother – David, who told a lot. I just laughed. If I did those things now it would kill me and be considered criminal.

    After Christmas, it was time to get busy and start really looking for employment. My funds were getting really low. I spent every day looking on the internet. I canvassed hospitals, the city, the county, internet web sites, newspapers, googled, etc. The week after Christmas, I put in 37 applications and sent out many resumes. Then come New Year’s Eve. I slept.
 
   Living in a small house with 3 boys, under the age of 16 years old, who cuss like sailors and challenge everything is a strain on the senses.  There were some tense times. I realize my niece gave birth to those boys; she loves them very deeply, but she is no mother. Same goes for their fathers.  The x-Box, internet, cable television, and the streets have raised those three boys. They very seldom ate anything other than noodles. They never picked up after themselves and they think nothing is frighting at 12midnight. Let’s not mention, when they take off, they are gone for two and three days in a row and my niece has no idea where they are—especially the 13 year old.

   The oldest (who is 15) is a compulsive liar and pleaser. I wonder about him though. He tries not to but it is a defense mechanism. My niece has them trained to call their fathers for money. She spends all the child support money on them, but, for frivolous reasons.  When she could spend the money on food, she would rather buy them an x-Box game or $200.00 pair of tennis shoes.  If you try to ask them how their day was, expect anything but the truth. His grades in school are average, but his social skills with his own peers are way below the level they should be.

   The 13- year old and the 15- year old have the same father. A Vietnamese-American left over from the product of a Vietnam affair with an American soldier. The two brothers look nothing alike. The oldest has Asian features. The youngest has European features. But the youngest I worry about. We didn’t always get along and I have had to call the police to him twice. He has even been to Child Protective Services. A lot of good it did to get Social Services involved. What good does it do helping a child, and putting them back into the same situation when the mother won’t get help and there has been no overall improvement in the home? Not to mention this 13- year old looks younger than the 11- year old. He never really has grown. He also stays gone for as much as 7 days and God only knows where. He doesn’t like school and doesn’t attend. No one seems to care about him. When other people do care is the only time my niece gets involved.

   The 11- year old is a different matter. The youngest has a different father.  His father too is a product of a Vietnamese-American soldier affair. But, he didn’t get kicked out of the country. He stole a boat and traveled the pacific until he made his connections. Some of those connections were honorable and some not so honest. He has done and dried off cocaine numerous times. He and a sister were adopted by good Catholics just in sponsorship. This year he is over 45 and looks 90. His looks have gone and the ugliness of this man is showing.  The 11-year olds father has also served time in Louisiana for the sexual battery of an under aged infirmed person and cocaine use. He is a registered sex offender who doesn’t register.

    The youngest has everything. Also a major drama king, he really knows how to yank a chain. What is bad about the behavior of this child, he never takes a bath! After three days, his oldest ½ brother forces him to bathe. Then a war is on. This child is a hole-maker in walls, screams and cries the loudest, and turns absolutely cold in his eyes.  He also will hide the telephone and lie as well if not better than his older brothers. That is a common trait they share, all three have a lying capacity to protect themselves and all their crazy activities. They also live and believe in x-Box. It scares me to think about them as adults because they will be un-learned and ignorant like their mother and fathers.

    This type of atmosphere in which I have chosen to reside in is a vacuum. It will suck you in to a new type of drama in which all the fish swim against the current to an emotional death.  The highlight of my niece’s day yesterday was to bring me a paper plate and show me what was stopped up in her waste drainage in her home. It was petrified feces mixed with some type of oily residue. She had to show it to our neighbors who were pathetically board captive on lookers. But, I realized that I was sadly interested in what petrified feces looked like. I now can say that I have seen it all!  (To be continued…….)