Don’t neglect the Midwest

It only took a day or two of interacting with the California natives at my college before it was revealed to me. He said it so casually that if I hadn’t truly been listening, I might have nodded and skipped over his egregious error.

“I’m from just outside Chicago.”

“Oh, the East Coast,” the boy on the second floor of my freshman-year dorm said. I had just learned he was from Orange County, born and raised in Irvine, CA.

“Wait, what did you just call it?” my eyes widened.

“The East Coast.”

“No, you didn’t, there’s no way. How far away from New York do you think it is?”

“I don’t know, somewhere around that area.”

“Well, Chicago’s in the Midwest.”

“Same thing.”

Never mind the thousands of miles to the Atlantic between. It seemed that anything outside the Golden State was just east.

At first, I was dumbfounded by the general lack of awareness of the world outside California. But I began to see it more and more, not just in general geography but also in what they thought they knew about my home.

Mention hot dogs or deep dish, and I might get a nod from someone whose parents grew up in Michigan. Sure, most of my male California-bred counterparts know the name Jordan, and Kanye is a common topic of conversation. But mention my city, and a good amount will shout out: “O-Block” or call it “Chiraq.”

It felt dismissive that they knew the city by violence first, not from a distaste for it, but rather viewed from the perspective of a voyeur. There’s a fascination with the cultural manifestations that come out of Chicago, particularly when it comes from the South Side. One of these is Drill rap, an entire genre cataloging an ongoing onslaught of gang violence that has gained popularity among white listeners hailing from suburbia. Rappers like King Von and Chief Keef’s popularity put the Parkway Garden Homes apartment complex into the spotlight. Most of these young men wouldn’t realize that O-Block is a nickname for Parkway Gardens, nor that the “O” stands for Odee, a young man who was gunned down at the gates of the apartment complex in 2011.

At times, it felt like I was the first person some had met from Chicago; there was an emphasis on violence and not much else.

But I lived a world away from the bloodshed. While I know folks who experienced it firsthand on the South Side, I can’t really ever know what their world was like. I have put myself in the middle of Douglass Park in the heat of the summer and come out unscathed and unafraid because, really, I’m a white girl.

Deep down, I find my frustration building at the fact that they don’t have context for my city. Where the segregation has come from, and why it has stayed. Where the violence comes from, and why it is so insidious rather than something to elicit an open-mouthed gawk.

It makes sense that what they would know about my home comes from television and the internet. Even though I doubt many of them would watch NBC or ABC, they echoed the sentiments of the five o’clock news: “If it bleeds, it leads.”

There is no desire to get to know my world, and there is no need to set the scene; it would ruin the mystique. Understanding that the long-standing issues of Chicago are related to a broader set of issues in a societal context is possibly too complex. Issues that led to the murder of Laquan McDonald, shot 16 times, mostly in the back, by Chicago police. Issues that have led to chronic abuses of power. Issues that seem rather insurmountable, as each year, millions are spent attempting to remedy police misconduct.

However, it was not complex when I was in fifth grade; I learned it just fine. Sure, I have a leg up in getting to experience stories from those who can offer them firsthand. So, I have a certain extent of grace to offer, but I draw the line at East Coast, a blatant disregard for our differentiation from New York City.

It’s hard to get to know Californians when you come from another place. The further I go from Chicago, the more I realize how it has shaped me and formed who I am today. Without knowing a bit about my city, you are missing out on parts of me.

But sure, there were things I wasn’t privy to concerning Californians. For instance, a real one would never refer to the state as “Cali,” nor would they pass up the chance to take the day off due to “rain.” One of the most fascinating things I have found in getting to know my West Coast counterparts is that they care to be in the know. Where I could fly under the radar for weeks from my Illinois friends, I could keep my life relatively private in some respects – they care to know in California. I have found one of my favorite responses from my roommate from Rancho Santa Margarita to be the singular word: explain. At first, I didn’t know what to explain. For a brief moment, the question bothered me in a way I couldn’t justify. Why do you care about my business? But then, I started to listen to how they would tell their stories, how they would set the scene to portray the dynamics at play. Once I learned, I became like them. I yearned to know more about the present lives of those around me. I became excited to explain, so much so that I wouldn’t need to be told to. Truly, they care to know what is occurring in the lives of those around them.

Now, when someone assumes it’s the “Windy City” because of the weather or conflates Chicago with New York, Philadelphia or Boston, instead of complaining, I say “explain.”