HT100 Challenge #90 - This Is Your Life
Hmm, forgot this was supposed to be an opening paragraph, wasn't thinking that when I wrote it. I guess it could work that way. 107 words.
One Saturday afternoon, when I was eight years old, my father came into the house looking angry but sounding excited.
"Get your coat on, boy."
I listened as he explained to my mother, "Damn nigger's been messing with a white woman. Some of the boys have him down to Jacob's Woods."
When my mother objected, claiming I was too young -for what, I didn't know - my father rested a heavy hand on my shoulder and said, "He's old enough to know right from wrong. Old enough to learn how it is."
That was the day I saw my first lynching.
~*~*~*~
Excerpt from "Proud American" by Vernon Shillinger
One Saturday afternoon, when I was eight years old, my father came into the house looking angry but sounding excited.
"Get your coat on, boy."
I listened as he explained to my mother, "Damn nigger's been messing with a white woman. Some of the boys have him down to Jacob's Woods."
When my mother objected, claiming I was too young -for what, I didn't know - my father rested a heavy hand on my shoulder and said, "He's old enough to know right from wrong. Old enough to learn how it is."
That was the day I saw my first lynching.
~*~*~*~
Excerpt from "Proud American" by Vernon Shillinger