genuinely love Baltimore so much¶

I genuinely love Baltimore so much. Small town vibes, big city values. It feels like everyone has the ethos of everyone being a friend until proven otherwise. You see a trans girl petting a stray cat on the front stoop? That's your friend, go talk to her! Bring some cat food too! I truly believe solidarity and radicalism is deeply woven into the fabric of this city. The "normal people" are instinctively progressive and have a strong nose for bullshit, and then there's also an active contingent of more organized radicals. I don't know much about what people are like in the "nicer neighborhoods," but I have definitely always felt at home in the places that people who have never been here love to deride as "crime-ridden" and "dirty." There is crime, there is dirt, but the PEOPLE are rock solid. I've never felt out of place. I've never been treated with hostility or given weird looks, even as I started to transition. I'm white in a mostly-black neighborhood, and no one treats me like an outsider. If you don't act like everyone around you is out to get you, they won't be. If you want to be left alone, you'll be left alone. If you want to chat, you'll be chatted. Someone might walk up and ask if you wanna buy some piercings, and if you say no, he'll just say "Alright ma'am, have a nice day!" Basically what I'm saying is that I feel like I wasted the first 29 years of my life NOT hanging out on my front stoop.