Memory in the Moss

Way back in the 1950’s, when Morgus the Magnificent entertained young and old, an eight year old white girl lived on Grand Route St. John in New Orleans.  Some days her next door neighbor and best friend couldn’t come out to play with her. She wandered down the block in search of something to do.

Two boys about her age tossed a ball; before long the little girl tossed the ball with them. They played tag, and then hide-n-seek. The threesome met regularly after that, playing hard, climbing trees, fighting vampires or the civil war. With an accent from Chicago, she invariably represented the North. Two boys against one younger girl wasn’t much of a fight, so the black boy fought on North with her. The little white boy always got to be the Confederate General.

The Confederate General could beat the other boy or the little girl, but the two together creamed the general’s behind, who was then called in to cleanup. The other two played catch before sitting on his grandma’s porch to cool off.

A couple of his aunties and some cousins surrounded this tiny, tiny lady whose ebony skin looked like worn out shoe leather. Who was the tiny old lady they seemed so fascinated with, the little girl wondered.

“Girl, your folks know where y’at?” The old woman looked directly into the girl’s eyes.

“Yes, Maam!”  The girl looked down at the ground. Her mother knew she was on the block; that was good enough.

The withered woman with the softest voice asked questions, teased and joked with the other women on the porch, while one of the aunts painted her miniature French poodle’s toenails bright red. Soon the little girl was dipping the brush into the paint.

“Who is that old lady,” the girl asked her newest friend, the young woman with the dog.

“That’s my great-great grandma,” she said in between puffing air on her black poodle’s crimson toenails. She stuck a paw in the girl’s face. “Blow!” She laughed, and then placed her index finger to her lips, “Ssshh, listen to mah-mau.”

“The mastuh give this house to mah granddaddy; I remember the mastuh from when I was a little girl. Granddaddy say he a good man. He give him this here house and always treat him fair.

Others say time not much more different from when we was slaves.”

The frail woman, who seemed small to an eight year old, raised her wrists, showing hands with knuckles so huge it looked like they hurt.  She shrugged and motioned towards the little white girl.

“I picking cotton before I hur age. This mah house.” Her head nodding as she turned to take in her house.

The eight year old white girl excused herself, telling the elderly lady,”It was nice to meet you; thank you, Maam.”

She skipped home, thinking this lady she just met was someone very special. All through dinner she tingled with excitement; after doing dishes and taking a bath, she could lay on the floor in the dark with her little brother listening to Morgus, the Magnificent on the transistor radio.