Beautiful

When I was working at City of Refuge, one of my daily tasks was to accompany another staff member on his route to pick up children from the community. Our fifteen passenger van careened around tight curves and narrow roads as our driver yelled, “Roller coaster!” which was his passengers’ cue to put their hands in the air and scream. In his van, I came to terms with my inevitable death many times. The children loved him. I, not so much.

That summer was one of paradox. I remember the shock I felt on our first morning (a shock that never really went away) when we turned a corner and there it was, filling our horizon. The Georgia Dome. As we traveled our bus route, I remember thinking, “What must it be like to grow up beneath the shadow (literally) of such wealth?” The children in the English Avenue community, Vine City and Joseph E. Boone are poor—food stamps, drugs, low education levels, out-of-wedlock children; every negative stereotype you associate with inner city Atlanta is true about this area. And they live within walking distance of a land of excess, where paying $180 for a ticket to a football game is a thing people do. Midtown—yuppie downtown Atlanta—is a short bus ride away. And these children and their families are struggling to live hand to mouth in the shadow of the Georgia Dome.

I’ve left Atlanta. I moved away and it broke my heart to leave the children and the city. I live under the shadow of the mountains now and it’s beautiful, just as beautiful as Simpson Street.