It is an interesting, terribly wicked experience that Black women had in the south and the situations that arose out of them. My cousin Cottie's experiences sit on my mind at the moment. Her mother was my great-grandfather's sister, who's name does not come to me at the moment. As a young woman, she worked as an assistant to a white doctor, basically as a maid. She turned up pregnant, with my cousin Cottie. It was a dangerous thing for women of color to work in white homes and work for-be in the presence of white men, because rape was prevalent and they were at the complete and total mercy of these men. The numbers of Black women working as maids who took home mulatto children afterwards is quite considerable; it did not stop with the plantations.

Alas, my great-grandfather, as most were not able to back then, vowed that "his daughter's would never work in any white man's kitchen." Also, it is said that he never let any white men into his house (perhaps the only white person allowed in his house was his mother-in-law, my great-great-great grandmother Caroline Roper).

To compound these blighted tales, you also have the conundrum that is the most awful legacy of these events. To these white men, these women were all at their mercy, and that included all, even the one's that they produced themselves.

Another slightly different story is that of my Cousin Lillian and her siblings. Now I am totally wicked and going to hell, but I will get to that later. Anyway, Cousin Lillian was a dear old woman, she died at 99 years old a few years ago, and was still here in all of her glory, mind and all. Her grandfather was the founder of the town that my maternal family hail's from,Daniel Pratt. She did not want to hear that one,Her blue eyes would get red hot when that subject came up. Anyway, Daniel Pratt fathered Cousin Lillian's father ( and appropriately, allowed him and all of his descenedants to be buried in the Pratt family cemetary. Oh how wonderful are white folks.)and a few years later, his white son(Lillian's uncle), fathered Lillian's sister by her mother. That too, is an interesting situation. Not quite the same, but indeed interesting.

Anyway, I am totally going to hell. Every summer they would cart Cousin Lillian out at the founder's day celebration and have her talk about the early history of the town and all that jazz. Anyway, Daniel Pratt's other descendants in the town, the white ones, were quite active and around. Among these was my ninth grade math teacher, Mrs. Bugay. Mrs. Bugay was fabulous, love her to death. She is absolutely a classy act. But still, I had to. So one day, I was in the hall, going somewhere and Mrs. Bugay was on her way somewhere too. We stopped to talk and I decided that I was going to be a bit mischevious. So at one point, I chimed in, "Oh, and Mrs. Bugay, I know one of your cousins." " Oh you do?" She chimed in in response. I said, " Why yes, Lillian Gholson." Her response, " Oh why yes, I know Ms. Lillian. She's a sweet old lady." She handled that one with much class. I love Mrs. Bugay. Anyway, oh the tangled webs.