The Bottoms
“There weren’t any new magazines I wanted to read, so after I had swept up the cut hair, Daddy gave me a couple pennies and sent me on my way.
I went over to the general store, spent a long time looking at bolts of colored cloth, mule harnesses, and all manner of dry and soft goods, geegaws and the like. It came down to a Dr Pepper out of the ice barrel, or peppermint sticks.
I finally zeroed in on the peppermint sticks. My two cents bought four. The storekeeper, Mr. Groon, bald, pink-faced, and... generous, winked, gave me six sticks, wrapped them and put them in a sack. I took them back to the barbershop, left them for picking up later, then, with no hair to sweep, and nothing to do, I went roaming.
From time to time I liked to visit Miss Maggie. That’s how she was known to most. Not as Maggie or Auntie, as many elderly colored women were called, but simply Miss Maggie.
Miss Maggie was rumored to be a hundred years old. She worked every day and somehow managed to plow a little crop with a mule named Matt.MoreLess
I went over to the general store, spent a long time looking at bolts of colored cloth, mule harnesses, and all manner of dry and soft goods, geegaws and the like. It came down to a Dr Pepper out of the ice barrel, or peppermint sticks.
I finally zeroed in on the peppermint sticks. My two cents bought four. The storekeeper, Mr. Groon, bald, pink-faced, and... generous, winked, gave me six sticks, wrapped them and put them in a sack. I took them back to the barbershop, left them for picking up later, then, with no hair to sweep, and nothing to do, I went roaming.
From time to time I liked to visit Miss Maggie. That’s how she was known to most. Not as Maggie or Auntie, as many elderly colored women were called, but simply Miss Maggie.
Miss Maggie was rumored to be a hundred years old. She worked every day and somehow managed to plow a little crop with a mule named Matt.MoreLess
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