“That Could Have Been Me”
Told by Diamante
Written by Jocelyn Espinoza
For 17-year-old Diamante (not her real name), violence in Reading was always present. Witnessing fights in elementary school, Diamante was confused because it wasn’t part of her own life. But she also realized quickly that it seemed to be “normal” among many of these kids. As she got older, it became her “normal.”
Fighting was happening in school and on the walks to and from school. Diamante fought twice, the first time at 12 years old, when a disagreement with another girl escalated. Her second fight, at 14, involved a feud among friend groups. Diamante fought because the common attitude was that if someone said something negative towards you, you had to defend yourself. Today, Diamante knows “I could have definitely handled it another way. I didn’t need to fight.”
Diamante and her friends’ mentality changed over time as they matured and saw the consequences their peers faced as they continued to get into fights. Her brother and two cousins were all shot due to fights. One of her cousins was killed. Her brother almost died. It hurts. “And thinking about that and remembering, seeing the sights of all of that, it’s really traumatizing. It’s literally watching someone you love almost pass away. And that sticks with you.” It’s awful. “But it’s things that we have to deal with” in Reading.
Diamante doesn’t always feel safe walking in Reading. One of her friends had a scary experience. She walked the same route every day and hadn’t realized that she had been passing by the same person each day. Then, he tried to grab her, but she was lucky since other people were nearby to help. Now, this friend takes different ways home. Now she
carries mace, pepper spray, and the keychains you see on TikTok. “And it’s just kind of sad because nobody should have to go through that.” No one.
Diamante and her friend started researching together about ways to be safe and learned about changing their patterns. Now Diamante changes up the routes she takes walking to and from school and other places.
Let’s say if I go straight home after school, I do that for a week, and then I’ll go down a different block, then turn, and then go home. Or I never take the same way home from work twice. If I go this way, then I’ll go that way. Or if I go straight home one day, I’ll stop at my sister’s house, then go. It’s always something different. Every week. Because if I changed every day, I wouldn’t remember what I did. It’s every week, something new.
Diamante copes with her fears and sadness by talking to people that had similar experiences. When they lost their cousin, she talked to her sisters, who understood how she was feeling. Helping others is what she wants to do for the rest of her life. “I received help in a certain way, I would be able to give that to people the best way that I can times 10.”
When things get hard for her, Diamante “just really digs [her]self into schoolwork, like dig deep to dance, cheer, school.” Dance is really special: “Being a dancer and the people around me because when you dance, it’s like a different type of expression. And you could really actually let go of all your anger, your aggression, the grief you’re feeling. It’s like you feel it go through.”
Diamante thinks about that friend and all the friends she had in elementary school, and how they laughed and played together. Now, they are teens like Diamante. Some sell drugs to earn money since they can’t get jobs or just because they see other friends or relatives doing it and others don’t go to school at all because they don’t have family to guide them. Some of these teens carry guns, sometimes for safety, and other times because it’s part of the culture. One of these teens is about to go to jail “for something that he did, all because he wanted to do something with his friend. It’s all dumb stuff.”
“That could have been me,” Diamante knows. But she made better decisions with a lot of support from her family. Diamante wants to help Reading’s youth to make better decisions: “You can be presented with situations-how you decide to handle it at that exact moment” can be life-changing.
Diamante feels strongly about helping her community. She felt tired of “complaining” about the things she saw happening, so she decided to start doing something about it: “If I saw something wrong, I stopped talking about it, did something about it.” That’s her advice to her peers: “So if you see something wrong, go do something about it.” She knows it takes time and patience to see progress.
Diamante is certain that violence must not be normalized and wants that taught. Kids and teens should grow up with more positivity and guidance. The way she sees it, “If you plant a
flower and you give it bad energy and bad this, all that, it’s not going to grow and become beautiful. But if you feed it positivity, energy, affirmations, you’re going to have a beautiful flower in the end.”