Things Learned From My Blood

EMERGENCY: Help Me Save My Home. Live From Black Brooklyn,NYC

Tangina Stone

Jul 09, 2026

The women whose blood is running through me, taught me to fight like hell.

To recognize when something is worth fighting for.

This is my home.

Somewhere in Bedstuy, Brooklyn there is a sanctuary of a house.

On a quiet tree lined block, there sits an elderly looking brownstone. It stands tall and wise with beauty and features that are understated and meant to be taken in from a seat on the stoop.

It’s located “Up South”. Where whole hogs were once roasted in the backyard on a homemade firepit grill, to feed the whole block. From my bedroom window I can eye where rows of collards used to catch their first frost. And a rare variety of grapes come visit on vines that were once the main source of Brooklyn’s moonshine, when southerners were looking to find it.

This is my home. Our homes. Our place of safety and peace. Where stoop barbecues happen and somehow there are always enough plates and love and blankets and joy, to go around.

This is where intergenerational bonds are forged under oak trees and house music.

Where there is a shared sense of innerstanding.

Somewhere in Bedstuy Brooklyn there are sanctuaries in peoples homes that are now at risk.

Where Black families work their whole lives to build them up, and live long enough to see it all stolen away. Where people live their whole lives guided by the principles of the Sankofa symbols welded into iron gates and points of entry, just to get stolen from in return. Held hostage by probate courts and victimized by frauds. Debilitated by the displacement.