Far Away San Jose

I've been living in San Jose my whole life. My family lived in East Side San Jose on Winslow near Grand Century before I was born. I was only able the breathe ESSJ air for only a few months after I was born. My parents decided they did not want to raise their children in an environment filled with gang activity, drug dealing, things that would impede their children's development. Prior to living there, they had lived in East Palo Alto infested with crack addiction and dealing. Now what once was our neighborhood is now Ikea and a huge shopping plaza.

Basically, during that time in '88, many impoverish areas in San Jose were populated by Vietnamese; many of those areas were still developing while refugees were resettling in neighborhood that already had existing problems. My parents, while they were split between community vs. affluence, chose to move out into a more "safer" community called Willow Glen. There were little to none Vietnamese resettling there.

San Jose. A city so big, I have yet to explore most of it. The more I drive around San Jose in my car pumping gas the more I want to walk with my feet around Berkeley. For once, I feel like I belong in a community that is somewhat knit-tight unlike where I've been living for most of my life which is incredibly spread out.

I miss my friends from Berkeley. I miss my friends from San Jose although I've been home. A lot of people are changing, I'm changing. There has to be change for there to be a tomorrow as corny as that sounds. I'm pretty sure many people experience this. When they come home from college after a few months, they notice a lot of changes that took place: home, family, friends (especially). I see my friends who've attended their first year college far away come back with newly-formed perspectives and outlooks whereas a lot of my community college friends stayed pretty much the same. I'm one of those 1st year far away college people.

There is so much to learn, yet such a big space to cover. I feel like a shadow within a shadow of something much bigger. I'm on my way in reclaiming my shadow.