Blood Is Not Thicker Than Water

In the summer of 1949, I lay in the grass in "Grannys" back yard picking clovers with 8 year old Ada Bee, my black and only friend. Ada Bee had six fingers on her left hand and picking Clovers meant that I could stare at her hand without embarrassing either one of us. My "Granny" was actually a neighbor who had taken us in when my father left. She was kind and took brother and me fishing; cooked cornbread on the fireplace; made snow ice cream;taught us to can and love the Lord. On my special clover picking day, my blood grandmother, "Mammaw" came for a visit, which usually lasted a month because she had no actual residence and pawned herself off at one of her eleven children's homes during the year. It was now my mother's turn to house Mammaw, though mother had no actual residence, either. Hopefully Granny would like Mammaw since they both loved to fish and Mammaw would have a place to live for another month out of the year. Ada Bee and I were giggling just as Mammaw walked up, ecstatic that we had found a four leaf clover. I smiled anxious to tell her of our luck, but instead she grabbed my hair and began pulling it with vengeance and slapping me hard. I was in shock as I ran all over Grannys' 13 acres, cutting my legs on the barbed wire fence and blackberry thorns, falling down, as she continued to chase me with a big Hickory stick. When I finally made it back to Grannys house, Ada Bee was gone. "Granny, Granny, I screamed, please help me!" "No Josie! Granny said, Ada Bee is a nice little girl and there isn't anyone else to play with around here!" Granny kept turning in circles covering me with her big apron so that Mammaw couldn't hit me with that stick. She could have easily said, "Josie, please leave my home", but she didn't. It was at age eight, that I learned people are prejudiced and have hate in their hearts and this hate is further harvested by what they teach their children. It was then that I learned never to judge a person by the color of their skin. There have been times when I have wished that everyone could feel the intrusion on innocence that I felt as it may have made them a better human being. I also learned that God does not love one of his creations more than he loves another of his creations. Nor does he love one land more than another land that he created. Someday, I hope He will tell me what happened to my friend Ada Bee for I never saw or heard from her again.