Ash in the air

Ash in the Air: East LA, 1992



People talk about the ’92 riots like they were a moment in history, but for us—they were a moment in memory. Not something we just read about or saw on the news. We lived it. We breathed it. We carried it. It didn’t just set LA on fire—it exposed the heat that had always been there, simmering just under the surface.

I was a teenager in East Los Angeles. Brown-skinned, streetwise, loyal to my block. We didn’t have much, but we had each other—and we had pride in where we came from. So when the city exploded over the Rodney King verdict, it felt like the whole world tilted on its axis. And somehow… we knew nothing would be the same again.


---

We were just out on the block tossing a football, killing time like we always did, when Rockhead came out of his house yelling, “Hey! They’re rioting over the verdict—it’s on TV!”

We ran into his living room, crowding in, eyes locked on the screen. The Rodney King verdict had just dropped. They acquitted the cops. Not guilty. All that beating, and not guilty.

We were all thinking the same thing—that’s South Central’s problem, not ours. That won’t touch East LA. But we didn’t know. It already had. It just hadn’t caught fire here yet.

A little while later, the homies had a block meeting. The homies, the neighbors—we made a call:
No rioting in East LA. We’re not burning down our own. This was our neighborhood. Our streets. Our mothers walking to church. Our abuelitas looking out the window.

And right on cue, Alma came walking up from the boulevard, arms full—carrying a VCR. We got hyped—“They looting the boulevard?!” She just laughed and said, “Nah, I went up to the pawn shop and got my VCR out—just in case they hit it.” She wasn’t stealing—she was saving what was hers. That moment locked it in: we protect Maravilla. We don’t loot Maravilla.

The next morning, I woke up and thought something was wrong with my eyes. Everything was blurry. Off. My throat felt dry. My head heavy. Then I realized: the sky wasn’t just gray—it was full of ash.

Ash in the air. Smoke in the lungs.
Los Angeles was burning.

My homeboy who lived off Central and Washington came rolling in like a legend—arcade machine in his living room, like it was Chuck E. Cheese. We tried to go out and see what we could find, but by the time we made it out there, everything was already up in flames. One of the homies had a bag full of Swatch watches—handed me a bunch like candy. My mom still has them, tucked away in a drawer. Still in the wrappers. She once told me they might be collectors’ items one day. Maybe so.

Then came the dusk-to-dawn curfew.
No one allowed on the streets after sundown. But of course… we were young. Restless. Mad. Alive. We hit the streets anyway.

And the East LA sheriffs?
They made sure we paid for that decision.

They pulled us over, packed us into the back of a patrol car like sardines. One of them hit me in the balls so hard I saw stars—still can’t believe I had kids after that. Another grabbed my homeboy Clipper by the neck, yanked his face close and smacked him with his own cap, yelling like a man possessed:

> “Our city’s on fire! People are dying right now and you’re out here f***ing around!
What if I went to your house and raped your mom?!”



Yeah. He really said that.

That rage—their rage—was personal. Like we had lit the match. Like we were the reason for it all.
But we weren’t. We were just kids. Trying to make sense of a world gone mad.

The next day, they brought in a tank.
A real tank. Parked it right in front of the old Sears on Soto and Olympic.
East LA turned into a warzone.

But through it all, we stood firm.
We didn’t burn down our neighborhood.
We protected it. We looked out for each other. We held the line.

Because East LA ain’t just a place on a map.
It’s a family. A spirit. A pulse.
Our beloved Maravilla.

Virgen de Guadalupe, cuida la Maravilla. Always.


---


That week changed me. Not just because of the smoke in the air or the fires on the news.
But because I saw what it meant to love where you come from.
What it meant to protect it—even when the whole city was falling apart.

We saw the system fail in real time.
We saw power used like a weapon.
And we also saw something beautiful: our own people choosing not to destroy, but to defend.

The ashes settled. The fires were put out.
But the memory? That never left.

And when I look back now, I remember that even in chaos—even in injustice—we stood with heart.
With pride.
With Maravilla in our blood.

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