I met Carol when I returned to Atlanta, to college, in August of 1990.  By then I was convinced that Bob Marley was a prophet, and that Bab-y-lon would soon fall.  When it did fall, I would be safe because I'd seen it coming and had covertly stacked up walls of protection:  critical essays, vegetarianism, cotton fabrics and research, lots of research.

Along with my two comrades, I rented a two-bedroom house.  Comrade number one, my promised fiance'; and comrade number two; one…

http://http://keebletalk.blogspot.com/2010/11/short-portrait-of-woman-tell-my-story.html

Ever read Gwendolyn Brooks' "Sadie and Maud?" In the poem, published in 1963, Brooks presents Maud as a mouse of a woman who chooses to leave home to attend college. Sadie, on the other hand, as full of vigor as her name suggests, stays home and pulls out some dichotomous mea culpa of adventure and pleasure, scraping life "with a fine toothed comb." In the end, Sadie dies early willing her "fine-toothed" aesthetic to her children, while her sister Sadie lives on, alone in her house,…