Today I had to trek out to one of the more far-flung areas of Toronto, taking subways and buses till I finally arrived at my destination. As I sat looking out the window of the bus in one particular part of town, I felt the little hairs on the back of my arms stand up in fear and fury. The Slums.

Lest you misunderstand, I'm not afraid of slum people. I'm afraid because I'm one of them. I was born in a part of Montreal that was never prosperous, and grew considerably less so over the decades. I got out. My family and I fled to suburbia, fled from the drafty, damp basement apartments, from the slumlords, from the rats. We worked - all of us - to ensure that we'd never have to go back. I did things beyond the comprehension of most of my middle-class mates, just to secure my place among them. Yet now, when I pass through a slum, a ghetto, my skin crawls, and I can almost hear their dirty streets calling out to me, reaching out to snatch me back into the fold. To bring me down.

I felt so much anger toward the people there. Not the newly arrived immigrants who spoke no English, but the Canadians - black and white - who were born to have the same opportunities as I had. They went to school. They had clean clothes and modest meals on the table. They could have been even more than me - I who blew most of my opportunities, or didn't recognize them at the time. Instead the white boys grew up to be meth heads, and the girls of both colors didn't grow up at all before bringing in the next generation. So it begins all over again. They'll never get out. And we have to wait and see what their children will do with the opportunities they're given.

I, the gutter child, fight every day against what I came from, lest it drag me back. The climb out is a hard one, the slide back can happen in the blink of an eye. I have gained too much, seen too much, accomplished too much, to ever go back. But nothing will ever make me forget.

Labels: Ghosts, Personal