All About You FRIDAY – Resurgo

In 1967, I was born in the city of Detroit to two immigrant parents from the Philippines. We lived in the Pasadena Apartments on Jefferson Avenue which was home to many Filipinos back in the day. I don’t remember much of it except that the hallways were dim and occasionally, my mom had to lift me over a drunk guy who had fallen asleep in front of our door. My mom and dad walked to work at the nearby Doctor’s Hospital, working opposing shifts so one of them could stay home with us kids. The year I was born was the year of the Detroit race riots. My parents watched from their apartment window as smoke rose from the streets below. I can only imagine what they were thinking.

In the early 70’s, we moved a few streets away to a townhouse walking distance to Friends School, a Quaker owned private school, where I attended kindergarten and first grade. My mom hadn’t learned to drive yet, so we navigated the city by bus. I remember shopping at Hudson’s department store, with its gold plated drinking fountains and the elevator that was manned by someone who asked you what floor you wanted to go on and closed the safety gate. It was magnificent.

In 1974, my parents had saved up enough money to have a house built in the suburbs. I remember each week after church, we would visit the house as we watched it being built. One time, I slipped on a board in my patent leather church shoes and fell and hit my chin, cutting it open. My dad had to take me to the ER and put in four stitches himself. Eventually the house was finished and we moved out of the city to Bloomfield Hills, into what must have felt like a castle to my dad. It was a far cry from the two-bedroom home that he had shared with his 9 siblings in the Philippines. He was 38 years old and now a father of four.

I thought about all of this last night as I sat in a movie theater watching a screening of Resurgo Detroit by filmmaker Stephen McGee. McGee moved to Detroit in 2005 after roaming the world as a photographer on a shoestring budget. He moved into the city at a time when buildings were crumbling. Though he worked for the Detroit Free Press, he was also hired by the New York Times, CNN and Fox News to photograph the urban decay. “Just send us pictures of the bad stuff,” he was told. And there was a lot of it.

But he saw more than that. “The World’s lens stopped at those challenges and so much strength was missed,” McGee said.

He bought an abandoned house for $1 and began renovating it with his wife. He rode his bike on the desolate streets and into the neighborhoods, documenting what he saw–the stories that get missed when you just drive by in a car. And he fell in love with the city and the people living in it. In the span of 20 years, he shot over 3 million photographs.

He was there when the Super Bowl came to Ford Field in 2006 and fake store fronts were put up and buildings were covered with large advertisement cloths to hide the blight from the rest of the world. His first child was born in 2013, the year Detroit filed bankruptcy. In that time, he pointed his lens at the people in the neighborhoods. The ones who were making life in the city work because they had no other option. The culture and the stories that shaped the city we know today.

“We create the miracle, not the outside world.”

“I don’t think Detroit’s come back. I honestly don’t think it ever left,” one said.

As the credits rolled on the movie and McGee received a standing ovation, I felt my heart swell with pride. For him. For the city of Detroit and its people. For my parents. Someone asked McGee what compelled him to make this documentary that spanned 20 years. “I believe in God,” he said. “I feel God’s love shining on me and I just wanted to turn my lens on people and shine some of that love on them.”

I hope he makes it rich. But even if he doesn’t, he is rich already.

Resurgo is a Latin verb that means “I rise again”. A mantra for anyone who has faced adversity and made it out on the other side.

You should go see the movie. It will be good for your soul.

Oh, and that $1 house McGee bought? This was the view from his front door: