English 101 – Essay on Categorizing
On Saturday, June 25th, 2022 the city of Cambridge is proclaiming “Pit Rat Day.” I won’t be there, because of a variety of reasons. But, part of my heart will always be on those cement benches, holding my friends’ hands and hugging them tight.
Below is an essay I wrote in Freshman English. I’ve often thought about this piece and the people I talk about in it, who I knew in the summer of 1995. I’ve changed all the names, and to be honest, I have no idea how accurate my memory was when I wrote it, and I can’t attest to any of the details now, but it certainly is true to the emotions I still carry when I think about the Pit. No offense or harm is intended to any person, whether real or imagined by my nostalgia.
So, here are the thoughts of 18-year-old me, looking back at 15 year old me:
The subway train pulls into Harvard Station, and men and women in business suits and pour out and head for the escalator which will take them effortlessly up to street level. As the light from above grows brighter, a few look up at the plexiglass dome. Some notice the backs of teenagers leaning against some of the higher sections, which are bordered by red brick As they step off the moving staircase and out of the stench of exhaust and urine below, they notice the smell of clove cigarettes and shouts of obnoxious teenagers.
They have found themselves in “the pit.” A section of sidewalk about three feet below where their colleagues and street merchants hustle to and fro has been created to separate the train station from the street. On one side it is bordered by a seeming skyscraper filled with bank offices and specialty stops. On the other sides are Memorial Drive (one step down from a highway) and Union Street. Harvard University’s walls rise on the other side of Memorial, and the Coop, a haven for those who pass over the tasty boutiques to spend fifty dollars on a sweatshirt which names their alma mater, ascends from Union. The businesspeople quicken their steps and race towards their apartments or waiting cabs and away from the teenagers who shake cups and holler “Spare-change!”
Despite what these passerby might think, not all the dirty, strangely dressed teenagers are out to take their money. Even though they all look the same to those who mumble that they don’t have any change or avert their eyes, the people there are all very different. Although all pit-rats have their own different reasons for being there and treat the square differently, pit-rats can generally be placed into three categories.
There are the pit-rats who stay only until it starts to get dark, and then grudgingly go home to their families who ask what they did all day. There are all pit-rats with families but who stay out all night, either because they don’t care if their families worry or their families don’t care what time they come home, if at all. And finally those how are most misunderstood by those first and the photographers and reporters who come to this “happening fashion spot.” (Halfway through the summer of 1995, the Boston Phoenix ran an article entitled “Life in the Pit: They Have the Attitude, the Look…But Is There Anything Else?”) These are the people who stay out all night, carrying huge duffel bags and many layers of clothing. These night pit rants have no homes to grudgingly go home to, or parents to ignore.
I was a member of the “day pit-rats.” My mother disapproved of me spending so much time in Harvard Square and insisted that I be home before it got dark. I made my daily escapes to the pit to be among people like me, who were ignored or perceived by their peers as “weird.” To fit in among these misfits, I wore almost all black, preferring long, flowing skirts. I mostly enjoyed spending time in Harvard because most of the people there, like me, had suffered some kind of physical or sexual abuse and would say hello and goodbye with a hug and call each other beautiful.
I spent most of my time with a small group of friends whom I got to know rather well. One girl was named Susan. Susan could usually be spotted by her forest green jacket and blue rimmed glasses. She lived with her mother who insisted she be home for dinner every night and who was divorced from Susan’s father who had sexually abused Susan and her younger brother. Susan came to the square for emotional support, but she gave back as much as she received. She would often sit with the homeless pit-rats and help them ask for spare change. Sometimes eh took subway fare for her earnings, but mostly passed it over to those who needed it more.
There was also Brad who had been physically abused and made almost deaf by his father. When I gave Brad his first kiss, he turned up the switch in his hearing aid and whispered that it was the greatest day of his life. He snuggled up to me until nightfall, looking at me with eyes that begged to be loved. He also helped Susan collect spare change, or as they called it “spangeing” and sometimes collected on his own. However, he always turned his earning over to Susan for distribution to the less fortunate.
Each night at about the time Brad, Susan, and I were looking at each other, deciding silently who would be the first to say good-bye, the night pit-rats started to gather in the stretching shadows of the square. The night pit-rats were more independent. They had given up on pleasing their parents and displayed their rebellion and disdain for society by getting tattoos and piercing various parts of their body. Compared to the day pit-rats, their clothes were more revealing and outrageous: all black or torn and covered with stains. Some brought stereos and played techno music while the street performers were on their breaks. They mostly just sat in the square, gawking at the gawkers who were on their way home or to the theater. These pit-rats all had a “devil-may-care” attitude and talked loudly about sex, drugs and music, sometimes even practicing one or more of the three.
The first night pit-rat I met was Frank. Frank was a tall, handsome, gay teenager who ran away from home every summer to live in the square and not to have to answer to his mother. He told me his stepfather was a homophobic who hated having him around. He carried an over-the-shoulder knapsack which held a few changes of clothes and his wallet with his driver’s license. When my parents weren’t going to be home, I invited him to spend the night with me off the streets, but he almost always had plans. Frank was clean and good looking and a tremendous flirt; he almost always had a place to spend the night.
The second night pit-rat I met was Tim. Tim was also very good looking except for a scarred and wrinkled left ear. He was very shy about this deformity, and I knew him a month before he admitted that his father, who he still lived with, had dipped the side of his face in boiling water when he was a toddler. Tim’s best friend was a pit-rat whose parents didn’t care when he came home, so Tim seldom slept on the streets when he could not go home.
Misjudged most often were the homeless pit-rats. Casual passerby and news reporters would sometimes see them as the most stylish. With little to do but amuse themselves with experimenting with their looks, their possessions were often one very trendy, though dirty outfit and a sleeping bag. They asked for spare change and were most often ignored by the businesspeople who turned their heads away from the stench of their body odor and smells of the subway. Most homeless pit-rats lived in the square because their parents had abused or frightened them so much they didn’t care to go home. Some had turned eighteen with no education options or job prospects and were turned out by the Department of Social Services that previously cared for them as minors. Because police forced them to keep moving throughout the night, they spent most of their days sleeping in parks or the historic cemetery adjacent to the square.
I met a few of these people well enough to learn their names and what specific circumstances had led them to the square. Amy had some trouble with an uncle, and her mother had denied the possibility of abuse, so she had run away from both of them. Blue had also come to the square to escape an abusive family to which the courts wanted her to return. She would only tell a few people her real name because DSS was still looking for her. Her sporadic eating habits and overwhelming stress had left her with ulcers that she couldn’t afford to treat. She once asked me if I would take her home so she could use my shower and sleep on a bed instead of the curb for a night. I couldn’t because my family was home, and they wouldn’t understand the circumstances. Instead, I bought Blue a cup of soup and hurried home through the dusk to my mother, who grounded me for getting back late.
Those who hurry past the shouts and open palms of this sub-society cannot see the needy individuals. They don’t stop to distinguish the rebellious from the helpless, or the frustrated from the desolate. To them, we all look the same. However, even now I realize that although there were definite categories that separated us, what we had in common was more important. Even if they passerby could realize the problems some faced, they couldn’t discern who was the most need. There was one thing that united the pit, whether we be due home at seven, or without a home at all. We all needed someone, not to reach into their pockets, but into their hearts for a little of the love we craved. We needed to both give and receive, and we looked to each other to fill this need.
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