“You’ll have to ask your father,” explained my mother, a third-grade history teacher at the same school my sister Claudia and I attended in Brownsville, Texas. What I was asking for was no simple thing. It was parental permission for a responsible sixth-grade boy, such as myself, to walk during lunch to an adjacent property to the school called the Snack Bar.
I did my best to write down my request as eloquently as I could, stating sound reasons why I could be trusted. Why I used the face of a clean white paper plate for my letter, I’ll never know. I do remember being excited and embarrassed – excited that my father agreed, embarrassed that I had to turn … Read the rest