Just switched from Reddit FYI
Until I went off to college in the city, I lived in a pretty dangerous hood in Baltimore with my single mom who had multiple jobs as a waitress, and a stripper at night (also provided escort services to some of her customers, and I slept in the bathtub when she did :/ ). When I was around 15, I cleaned windows & did yard work for a lot of my mom’s customers/clients to help with expenses. I could tell my mom hated her jobs, but she did what she had to, to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads. We stayed in a tiny one bedroom apartment, and my mom would come home at 3-4 am every night. Dad went to prison when I was young for assault, and I grew up around a lot of violence/drugs in general. Now I make okay money and I’ve brought my mom to the safer side of the city, but honestly I wouldn’t be where I am now without her hard work.
How did you survive (as in, your character and soul) in the hood compared to your peers? Like, not get sucked in the mentality?
I think a lot of people wanted the quick and easy route to making money which led to a lot of dangerous activity. But since I was around 10ish, I always kinda just kept my head down and just payed attention in class. I was alone at our apartment alot so I had a lot of time on my hands to just study/find my interests. I was pretty bad socially so I never really made friends, my only friend throughout my childhood was my momma 😂. I guess it kinda kept me out of bad circles I dunno.