Featured Prose ~ SS 2018
Passengers see you as a quiet little cab driver, your name ‘Ben’ printed in bold letters on your dashboard ID, an old black man whose African beads dangle from the rear view mirror, a small crack inches its way across the windshield of the well-worn taxi soon to be in need of new shocks. You’re wearing a soft flannel plaid shirt and short cropped hair, and have a pronounced “ah-ah-ah” preceding “Where are you going?”
You were a stranger to me that first time I stepped into the back seat of your cab, but over the years, you have become ‘Kwasi,’ an informal name given to Ghana boys born on Sunday and you call me ‘Ama,’ a girl born on Saturday. On our frequent trips to and from the airport, we talk of the home you are building back in your village for when you retire, your grown sons, born from different mothers, now married and living in Atlanta and Raleigh. You ask about my elderly mom as we pass our phones back and forth, sharing the latest photos of weddings, grandchildren, baptisms. We laugh at how God didn’t mean for us to go gray, so that’s why he invented hair color.
We laugh, not knowing God would soon call you home.
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Carolyn T. Johnson, a freelance writer from Houston, Texas, draws on her colorful life experiences for her writing. She writes from the heart, the hurt, the heavenly and sometimes the hilarious. Her work can be found in several big city newspapers, various anthologies and lots of e-zines.
Photo (Down That Road and Maybe the Next) Photo by Christopher
Woods Gallery -http://christopherwoods.zenfolio.com/
dreamwood77019@hotmail.com