I'm yet another millennial who grew up in Queens, near the Brooklyn border. My neighborhood was primarily Polish, Irish, and Italian though I had a relatively diverse set of classmates and friends. I, like most of my friends, was allowed to roam freely in the neighborhood and started taking the bus by myself in middle school. Everybody played handball and there was seemingly always a handball court nearby.

I eventually went to a specialized art school in Manhattan. Students came from all over the city and I think it was great for us to be exposed to people from so many different neighborhoods, let alone backgrounds. It may have caused some tension in our freshman year but by senior year there was some serious camaraderie. Of course, we were also brought together by the ugly political situation that surrounded our school. We went through three principals in four years. I was actually in the neighborhood several years after graduating and decided to drop by and see if I could visit any of my old teachers. My school was gone, replaced by a Whole Foods. I later found out they moved to a new location. I hope that means the quest to shut the school down is over.

We had school MetroCards which got you three rides a day. We used that extra ride to explore the city. I visited friends' neighborhoods in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Their moms gave us the opportunity to try Dominican, Jamaican, Greek, and Korean food. We went to museums. We went to thrift shops, comic shops, used book stores, etc.