Contributor: Gary Clifton
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In 1952, money in the neighborhood was tighter than wet underwear. Mom couldn't get many shifts in the chicken plant and we hadn't seen the old man since he ran off with that waitress from Omaha the year before. Any work was good work.
The smoking old truck sputtered up at 4:30 A.M. This was a strawberry day - pickers needed. I was nine that Summer and they wouldn't let a kid that young on the truck unless they were with an adult. I'd been climbing the side over the stock racks, but somebody snitched. Now the driver watched. Most of the adults were African American females - many with a string of kids attached. I asked Miz Wilson if I could follow her bunch as one of her kids.
She was old, maybe thirty-five, with multiple stomachs and a beautiful ebony face that couldn't stop smiling. "Squeeze between Isaac...
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Author:
Gary Clifton
