~Summary~

Down These Mean Streets.

In Down these Mean Streets, Piri Thomas talks about himself growing up in all these different neighborhoods. He lived with his mother and father and four siblings. In the beginning of the chapter, Piri talks about his father is so used to beating him up for like the most little mistakes that he would do. He sometimes wondered if his father loved him like the rest of them (his siblings). He had argued on page 22, “Maybe ’cause I’m the biggest, huh? Or maybe it’s ’cause I’m the darkest in the family”? All of these thought went through his head because of the mistreatment that he gets from his father. He was so upset that one day, he decided to leave home. Piri realized that he had nothing to eat or drink and had no way of surviving. He decided to go back home, with his father not even worried about where he had been at that particular point in time. Piri grew up very poor. His father had multiple jobs and he was always not the very happy at all times. His mom talked to them about Puerto Rico and how everything was all nice, and also how you did not have to have money to be happy. Down These Mean Streets also talks about a very hard headed boy who would do anything for respect. Piri was a very tough kid. He always felt that he should fit in regardless of where he was. The only way that he got reps in his neighborhood was through fighting. His father had always told him how he needs to man up and be a man in tough situations. He always hated his father for moving them to a almost Italian neighborhood. Over there, Piri had to show that he had heart and he could take away anybody, that landed him in the hospital but after that incident, he got his respect from the neighborhood bullies and he became a part of them. His family had decided to move because of all of this commotion. They moved to Long Island from the city. He hated Long Island. “No matter how much you busted your hump trying to be one of them, you’d never belong, they wouldn’t let you. Maybe they couldn’t. Maybe they didn’t belong themselves”.  He was fitting in in his new neighborhood and he hated one bit of it. He was so used to fighting and having heart and belonging in his old neighborhood, but not Long Island. “I can’t get along with anything, no matter what i do. Nothing falls right. I don’t like Long Island and los blancos, and this world full of shits”. Piri just was not feeling the vibe that he was getting from the city. He felt that it was nothing like Harlem. He wasnt used to this. Piri decided to leave Long Island because he said it wasn’t for him, he went back to Harlem without looking back reassuring his mother that he would come back and get her and even his father if his father didn’t mind moving back with him to Harlem.