Introduction

Earning My Wings

    When I was a kid, Mama used to

tell me I was an angel with a dirty face. And when someone I'd never met asked

her, "Is this your little angel?" she would playfully reply, "Yes, when she's

asleep and not dreaming bad dreams."

    I wonder if that's why, when I was four years old, she gave

me a nickel every day to take a nap! All I knew was that a nickel would buy

candy and bubble gum at the corner grocery store. And before naptime was over

and Mama missed me, I could be out the window, down the block, and back in bed.

    I got away with it -- for a while.

    Then one fateful day Mama made a trip of her own to Mr.

Mosley's store. "Why, Miss Cora, how are you today?" he asked Mama. "I see that

cute little Suzie 'most every day at about two-thirty, when she comes in to buy

candy!"

    The next day on my way back home from the store, whom did I

see in the distance, waiting for me in front of the house? Mama. And what was in

her hand? A long, freshly picked peach-tree switch.

    Needless to say, my days of sneaking out the window to buy

candy were over. It didn't matter that I told Mama I was saving some of my candy

for friends or that I just couldn't sleep in the afternoons. Although the

chances of running into danger in those days were minimal compared to the crime

rates today, Mama knew it wa