Ghost Light
A Memoir
Chapter One
To be an American kid in the fifties was to live in a sparkling,
hopeful world where ignorance really was bliss. Parents spoke in
euphemistic private codes rather than say anything that might mar
the tableaux of contentment they tirelessly constructed for wide
young eyes.
We lived in Somerset, where the streets were called Dorset and
Warwick and Uppingham and Trent-their very names a farcical affront
to reality. The English did not dwell in our bonny Somerset, and
neither did their local heirs, the Protestants, who had their own,
restricted neighborhoods barely miles away. Somerset, a subdivision
built just across the District line in Maryland but not far enough
from a city turning black to be among the most desirable of suburbs,
was mainly the province of Jews. The houses were not baronial
estates but mostly small and new, inhabited by men who had come back
from the war to build careers and ... read full excerpt from Ghost Light ebook
