face it. you’ll never truly be able to run from the fact that you’re a child of the suburbs. born and bred. remember high school? and how some kids barted over to logan from as far away as oakland. how or why, you don’t really know, but you recall then being the first time you heard someone claim THE TOWN and THE CITY in all caps. they held their heads up in a way that was foreign to you, except in songs. you envied how rappers would shout out new york and other metropolises you’d never been to before, how you listened intently to “california love” like pac was really going to call out union city. you proclaimed that you were going to put the une on the map, and you meant it, until college, where it was easier to say you were from sf. except when they asked you which part, and you lowered your eyes and said “it’s actually a small town 45 minutes away.” and how you made a point to say it was only 5 exits from oakland, when it was actually more like 9. you remember asian american studies, and learning about the model minority myth, and not wanting to believe.
you remember edward scissorhands, and michael moore docs, and how the scholars hadn’t yet coined ethnoburbs so you had no vocabulary to distinguish your upbringing from the kind on tv with the picket fences and synchronized lawnmowers. but you remember pre-colombine school shootings, and getting out of the way for the train to pass by while walking the railroad tracks from alvarado to walmart, and the field of gladiolas, and more asian bakeries than you could count. you remember how proud the white teachers were of the all america city award in ’99, and how proud the brown parents were, and how indifferent you were tho. you remember third grade, and winning an essay contest about your love for the american flag, the same year a sub sent you to the office because you refused to stand for the pledge, and how you’re not sure if you meant it during either of those episodes.
in middle school, you shopped for your cds at tower records in fremont hub, where there was no “rap” section, and you know that’s how you started identifying with “urban.” you know that’s most of why you spent half your time at davis trying to transfer to berkeley, and how before you even claimed your diploma you were claiming oakland. and how you made sure to point out that the overpass that divided your apartment from the best buy on hollis meant your address was not emeryville. and how when you think of those years in brooklyn you can’t help but think of rats, and when you think of those years in harlem you can’t help but think about the smell of hot garbage, and how you thought street smarts was mumbling to yourself loudly while waiting for the night train so the shadowy figures in the station wouldn’t fuck with you. you remember beijing smog, and dc sirens, and how it wasn’t even a year ago when you huffed about being done with city life before moving to venice, and how you’re more quick to call it LA. and now you’ve been at mom and dad’s house in the burbs for the past month and you’ve seen more lizards than roaches and you haven’t left the block since tuesday and you can’t front about how good it all feels right now even though you know this area code won’t ever mean shit in a song.