Fallen Fruit
theoretically, i'm down with this. theoretically.
practically, i have an issue. being from LA i know that a lot of the neighborhoods where fruit trees live are on the south and eastside of town, the older parts - neighborhoods like my father's, echo park, macarthur park, silverlake, east la, arlington, the neighborhoods bordering downtown la. these are mostly communities of color. or, they used to be.
gentrification is changing a lot of rules in urban neighborhoods but i know that my father's neighbor would not look kindly on some crunchy granola guy putting his hand up and taking a banana from the tree that grows on his front yard and happens to overhang the sidewalk. he has a machete and isn't afraid to use it.
when i was in hawaii with my family my sister and i walked down the street and pick up all the fallen mangos. we'd sit on the red dirt curbs and eat until our stomachs bulged and our faces were sticky with juice. mom would look at us and say, "that's the filipina coming out." but we'd pick fruit that had already fallen. when the neighbors saw us (and everyone had a huge mango tree) they'd bring out sacks for us and beg us to take what we wanted; no one could eat it all, there was so much.
before you take someone's fruit, shouldn't you ask?
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