Staying Safe Often Means Laying Low
Living with danger
Rosa Dimico has crossed paths with prostitutes and drug dealers for years on her way to Sonnenberg’s Market.
The 81-year-old widow pulls her purse closer to her body and turns her eyes away when they walk past.
She believes a quiet woman is a safe woman.
As she watches the sex and drug trade along East Sprague, Dimico knows the neighborhood that once held her heritage and heart is no more.
“This used to be a good family neighborhood,” she said. “I don’t see many families anymore.”
Dimico’s father, Salvatore Durante, was a 41-year-old railroad worker in 1915 when he mailed away for an Italian bride named Maria at the urging of a neighbor.
Maria, like dozens of other Spokane immigrants, met her husband for the first time minutes before their courthouse wedding.
The Durantes moved to a home on East First near Stone. Maria gave birth to Rosa, the first of three daughters, in 1916.
Life was simple. They raised goats, chickens and rabbits, and ate what they grew.
“Everyone in the neighborhood had gardens, made their own wine and raised animals,” Dimico said. “This was a regular Little Italy. Everyone was Italian in the neighborhood.”
While growing up, Dimico learned to sew flour sacks into clothes and preserve a season’s worth of vegetables. Her family attended Sunday Mass at St. Ann’s Catholic Church.
Life changed little until Interstate 90 split the neighborhood in the 1960s.
“The highway came through, Italians sold off their land and moved out of the neighborhood,” said Dimico, who now lives alone.
She lost touch with many friends, but she stayed in the family home, raised her children and paid little mind to the outside world.
The interstate brought changes in the mix of her neighborhood. As the Italians moved out, poor white, black and Asian families moved in. Eventually, drugs and prostitution followed.
Dimico kept her distance.
“I didn’t get acquainted with many of the neighbors because they weren’t Italian,” she said.
Now, Dimico cares for her 4-year-old great-granddaughter Angelica and 16-month-old great-grandson Devan while her grandson works.
She tells them colorful stories from her past, but she knows the charm of her neighborhood has finally faded.
When she’s gone, her cottage-style home may provide little more than shelter.
“They could sell it. They could live here. It doesn’t really matter,” said Dimico, thinking about passing on the home she was born and raised in to her children and grandchildren. “We always lived here. But I can’t expect them to. It’s whatever needs to be done.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo