When I was a child in the 1970s I grew up in a neighborhood with three Vanessas within a house or two from our duplex – including my sister – a Polish Ecuadorian, the Jamaican Vanessa around the corner and the Mexican Vanessa in the house behind ours, just across the yard before they built fences between all the houses. Before they did that (built the fences, that is) we just roamed free among all the backyards of the developing neighborhood that served as a global tour of cultures. My first best friend was a young girl named Aysha whose parents hailed from Brussels and New Delhi whose house I would escape to for samosas, naan with raspberry jam and butter whipped together, and Bollywood movies at lunch on the TV. Sometimes we would stir up all manner of bathroom and kitchen cleaner products with flour and baking soda just to see what would happen. Or ride around on our tricycles to meet up with other kids in the hood – like John whose disability had him using leg braces to walk or English Richard the auburn-haired kid with explosive freckles across his face who had a severe lisp and…