Personal Narrative Essay: Working At Peachtree Street

Ever since I was a teenager I can remember going downtown to Five Points before going to work at Turner Field. As soon as I would exit the front of station from Peachtree Street, I would be greeted by three or four tables line along Peachtree Street with street vendors trying to sell you everything from: candy, gum, honey buns, fruit, sodas, juices, Atlanta t-shits, caps and more. Don’t let it be raining outside, they’ll be out there trying to hustle dozens of umbrellas and rain jackets in their arms as well.

I moved to Atlanta during the summer of 1996 from Asheville, NC, originally from San Francisco, I was immediately attracted to Atlanta’s downtown landscape. It wasn’t as busy and massive as San Francisco’s, but it resembled Asheville’s though it was 100x bigger, but I loved that downtown Atlanta reminded me of a larger Asheville. At the age of 17 and attending Clarkston High School of DeKalb County Schools, I would often find myself downtown at least two or three times a week after school hanging out.

I met and quickly got acquainted with a lot of people from all over the city, people hanging out downtown. One particular person that I met was a street vendor who I grew up only knowing as, Donnie, an older man that always has a vender stand on the sidewalk of Alabama Street. Before catching the 97 Georgia Ave
From Alabama Street to Broad Street, Forsyth Street and even along Peachtree, there is a culture of people struggling to survive. Just the other day as went to Broad Street to begin capturing images of this upsetting ghetto lifestyle, I unknowingly took a picture of an individual going in the corner of a building and smoke on crack pipe as others stood around looking out for