Death of a beloved flattens and dulls everything. Connections do not adhere so closely, and important events lose some of their glow. - Maya Angelou

The Black woman in the South who raises sons, grandsons and nephews had her heartstrings tied to a hanging noose.

As I ate she began the first of what we later called “my lessons in living.” She said that I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and even more intelligent than college professors. She encouraged me to listen carefully to what country people called mother wit. That in those homely sayings was couched the collective wisdom of generations.

I had to trust life, since I was young enough to believe that life loved the person who dared to live it.