Jacqueline Woodson - Fresh air lyrics

When I get back to Brooklyn, Maria isn't there. She's gone upstate, staying with a family, her mother tells me, that has a pool. Then her mother puts a plate of food in front of me, tells me how much she knows I love her rice and chicken. When Maria returns she is tanned and wearing a new short set. Everything about her seems different. I stayed with white people , she tells me. Rich white people. The air upstate is different. It doesn't smell like anything! She hands me a piece of bubble gum with BUBBLE Yum in bright letters. This is what they chew up there. The town was called Schenectady. All the rest of the summer Maria and I buy only Bubble Yum, blow bubbles while I make her tell me story after story about the white family in Schenectady. They kept saying I was poor and trying to give me stuff, Maria says. I had to keep telling them it's not poor where we live. Next summer, I say. You should just come down south. It's different there. And Maria promises she will. On the sidewalk we draw hopscotch games that we play using chipped pieces of slate, chalk Maria & Jackie Best friends Forever wherever there is smooth stone. Write it so many times that it's hard to walk on our side of the street without looking down and seeing us there.