Jamaal & Shaniqua

Jamaal was 9 years old when he first showed up at the special school. He lived off of 3rd street, a section of town that demands a walker or a driver's undivided attention at all times...and that's during daylight hours. There is no intelligible need to go down 3rd street after dark. Only those who rule the night walk the streets in and around Jamaal's house.

Jamaal's house was built 53 years ago at a time where this particular neighborhood was just another sleepy burb in a small, mostly forgotten town. The "mouse" had yet to arrive, and oranges, lemons, and other citrus products were the sole life and welfare of sleepyville. Soon the mouse arrived and the city exploded upward and outward, bringing with it the decay of what was once good on the inward portion. Jamaal's house hasn't had a new roof since inception, and it leaks constantly during the rainy summer months. The house only has 4 rooms total, is mostly rotted out and fetid smelling, and there is no air conditioning to ward off the stifling heat of a central Florida summer, which only adds to the futility and anguish of impoverishment.

Dad? There is no dad, and never has been. Jamaal has 4 sisters, at least three of whom have different fathers as well. The oldest in the family is none other than Jamaal. Mom? She's unemployed and 24. That's correct. Do the math. Jamaal was the first and he's 9. Four more girls followed between age 16 and 23.

Jamaal has been in and out of "Home School" since age 5. "Home School" down here is not where mom or dad teaches...home school is inner city slang for being allowed into public school, with "home" being a child's so-called guiding light. Jamaal is only allowed so many discretionary mistakes in home school, most of them disciplinary. He has been to several exceptional learning specialists, and he has been deemed EMH (Educable Mentally Handicapped), ESC, or ESL. This is a very important designation for Mom. You see, Mom gets a check from the government for 3 of her 5 children who have been deemed EMH, ESC, or ESL. She's working on getting the other two designated as well.

The checks are no less than $500 a month per child. In Jamaal's mom's case, this is $1,500 a month...every month...as long as the kids do not achieve to a point where they lose their designation. The system is so upside down and corrupted, Mom will kick, scream, threaten race discrimination, violence, whatever...to keep Jamaal and his sisters "designated". The incentive for a parent...especially a parent in biological circumstances alone...is not there to teach values, character, and the quest for individual achievement.

"Designated" is money, and keeping the children stupid is the goal of the Mom.

Shaniqua lives two blocks away, and is a year younger than Jamaal. Shaniqua lives with her 5 cousins, 2 Uncle's and 6 brothers and sisters in her 3 room shack with no windows. At the tender age of 8, Shaniqua has a fantastic vocabulary, consisting of such words as "motherfucker," "bitch," "Ho," and other delightful phrases that we all want our young children to know. Uncle Charles is beginning to teach her the proper way to cut and prep coke to make "Crack". It's only fair, since Shaniqua has been delivering it to houses in the neighborhood for as long as she can remember, most times in the dark. It hasn't been so bad, she'll tell you. Every once in a while a nice man with let Shaniqua into his room, and for 5 minutes or so of hand and arm work, he'll give her a towel to clean up and then give her a dollar. A dollar to a 5 or 6 year old is big stuff, and all she had to to was make Mr. Jackson smile a little.

Shaniqua finds herself in consistent trouble in her 3rd trip through 1st grade, and one day she ends up with Jamaal in the "special school."

More to follow.