If I'm remembered for having done a few good things and if my presence here has sparked some good energies, that's plenty.

I was fortunate enough to have been raised to a certain point before I got into the race thing. I had other views of what a human is, so I was never able to see racism as the big question. Racism was horrendous, but there were other aspects to life.

I come from a great family. I've seen family life and I know how wonderful, how nurturing, and how wonderful it can be.

If the image one holds of one's self contains elements that don't square with reality, one is best advised to let go of them, however difficult that may be.

I couldn't adjust to the racism in Florida. It was so blatant... I had never been so described as Florida described me.

I am the me I choose to be.

But perhaps more important, as someone wishing to make a comment or two about contemporary life and values, I don't have to dig through libraries or travel to exotic lands to arrive at a view of our modern situation refracted through the lens of the preindustrial world, or the uncommercialized, unfranchised, perhaps unsanitized-and therefore supposedly more "authentic"-perspective ofthe Third World. Very simply, this is because that "other" world, as alien as if separated by centuries in time, is the one from which I came