47
Chapter One
I lived as a slave on the Corinthian Plantation my whole life up to
the time that Tall John ran out of the back woods and into my life.
I have no idea exactly how long the time before Tall John might have
been, but I was most likely about fourteen years old at that time.
Slaves didn't have birthday parties like the white children of
Master or the white folk that either worked for Master or lived on
the larder of his home.
Slaves didn't have birthday parties and so they didn't have ages
like the white people did. Big Mama Flore always said that "White
peoples gots as many ages as you can count but slaves on'y gots four
ages. That's babychile, boy or girl, old boy or old girl, an' dead."
I loved Big Mama Flore. She was round and soft and always gave me a
big hug in the morning. She was one of the only ones who ever showed
me kindness when I was little. My mother died when I was too young
to remember her face. Big Mama told me that my mother, her name was
Psalma, had a boyfriend over at the Williams Plantation but she
would never tell anybody who he was because she didn't want him
getting into troub ... read full excerpt from: 47 ebook
