“We looked for where the Viet Cong fired rockets, but those were big mountains,” said Morris. “Sometimes we were so close to the other side that we could hear their radio or them talking at night. I kept thinking this was unbelievable.” Skeeter Morris
On this day, a homeless man looked at his reflection in a coffee shop window, running his fingers through his beard. A young woman prepared to move to the downtown where "Happiness blooms from within" is painted on a storefront. A white cane swept back and forth across the sidewalk as a man walked with his dog, and a giant rocking chair named Goliath was covered in shamrocks and green tinsel.
A family placed flowers by a roadside cross, roosters stepped through a flooded field, and lightning streaked across the sky from a thunderstorm many miles away.
On this day, a white '57 Bel Aire with a red interior and "57 Kool" on the tag was hauled across Alabama. The owner said the car ran like new as he stopped to get gas and relief from his sciatica. A cup of grapes was dropped and left on a gas station floor, and the parking lot was full at the Funderdome skating rink.
A bike wobbled on the shoulder of a highway–the rider wore a shirt that read "Slay all day.” Cars from Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Tennessee packed with bags and beach gear drove north. A car broke down on the side of the road; the passengers had York Family on their shirts. Further up the interstate, a driver walked away from his car as dark gray smoke rose from the engine. Flaming pieces dropped to the ground.
“Some guys didn't like to go on alert because it was more risky than the average bombing of the jungle. There were bad guys down there who wanted to kill us. We had to kill them first.”
Gen. Guy Hecker
On this day, clothes hung on the lawn to dry. One shirt read, "The nightmare isn't over." Children dressed as spaceships or stars and listened to stories on an out-of0-this-world literacy day. Coffee was sold from a shipping container–a business project started by a mom for her home-schooled kids.
Two women talked about turning fifty, losing their parents, and feeling like orphans.
Crowns were worn and My Sharona was played as a whole town danced to an 80s cover band. All on this day.
On this day, a girl wrote, "I love you like all fire" on her leg, and a book advised, "Anything real begins with the fiction of what could be."
Hints of humidity returned, and gray roots were covered. Stories were told of cancer, a marriage to TG Shepard, and a necklace from Elvis. All on this day.
On this day, a Vietnam veteran told about almost dying in a ship fire, and a tire blew out on a uHaul van. A mockingbird flew twigs to her nest, and a baby squirrel escaped a cat.
Wisteria covered trees in the back of a pasture, and the temperature went to over ninety on a backyard thermometer.
A man died. He called himself Ronco, and one of his last Facebook posts was: "I am enough, Who I am is enough, What I do is enough, What I have is enough- Unknown." All on this day.
On this day, a housekeeper greeted guests on her floor: "Good morning my loves." She gets up early to care for her sick mother and then cleans motel rooms. She said her finances aren't lining up–life is hard, but others must be struggling, too. Making them feel better makes her feel better, too.
A college student missed a meeting because of a "messed up car." A gas station cashier said, "We've still got a little sense left, but it doesn't always go in the same direction."
On this day, a journalist tapped his cane with a gold alligator on the handle as he told stories of sitting on the roof of a cinder-block hotel in Somalia, watching tracer fire below. And of a dead body, tear gas, and chaos as Mississippi fought to keep integration out of Ole Miss.
A man sang "Amazing Grace" to his wife at breakfast, a crop duster sprayed a Delta field, and an odometer hit 100,000 miles, all on this day.
A normal biological event for half of the population, menopause has been dismissed, ridiculed or overlooked for generations. Adding to the confusion are symptoms that vary with each woman. It can be unclear when menopause starts, how long it lasts, or the correct names of treatments to use.
“It was a loving feeling that felt like everything was going to be okay,” he said. “We call that chasing the dragon because you're chasing the first high that you ever got. You will never be able to reach that first high, but psychologically you have to try.”
Prosecutors showed pictures of Kelsey’s lifeless body on the bed. One photo showed the tattoo on her side that read, “Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional,” above a flower.
The Our Southern Souls book sold out from bookstores and online sales, but it is now available on Amazon.
Davis Avenue, named after the President of the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis, was called The Avenue by locals. It was the center of business, shopping, socializing and entertainment for Black Mobilians who were unwelcome in many other parts of the city.
The Avenue was born during Reconstruction as a safe place for Black people to live and own property. As the population grew, Davis Avenue prospered through entrepreneurship and community, despite the restrictive laws of Jim Crow.
But that economically independent community collapsed with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, urban renewal, integration of schools and families moving away.
Those who grew up on The Avenue gave additional reasons for its decline: the closing of Brookley Field, the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the opening of shopping malls, racism, crime, drugs and blight.
There are about 10,000 graves in the 18.5-acre cemetery; military veterans are in more than 800 of them. Volunteers documenting Oaklawn predict that number will increase as they move deeper into the uncleared acres.
The 89-year-old cemetery, located at 1800 Holt Road, is non-perpetual care, meaning families of the deceased are responsible for maintaining the burial plots. Through the decades, the graves became covered by bushes, vines and weeds or upended by trees.
The veterans buried at Oaklawn served in World War I and World War II. They fought in Vietnam, Korea, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Located across the chain-link fence from the well-tended Catholic Cemetery on Martin Luther King Avenue, Oaklawn is an overgrown, forgotten burial ground for Blacks in Mobile. Most of Oaklawn’s 18.5 acres was established in the 1930s and 1940s with simple gravestones facing east. Death, like life, was segregated for many buried here.
Cassandra: “I was 14 when I met him, and the beatings went on for nine years. He beat me black and blue with a pipe. After the first few whacks, you go numb and can’t feel it anymore. He threw me out of the car and punched me when I was sleeping. One night he almost killed me, and I ran out of my house naked and bleeding, trying to save my life. Penelope House is where I learned I had been abused. That is how men treated my mama, so I thought all of that was normal.
I thought it was normal.
These are the stories of survivors of domestic violence in Mobile and Baldwin counties. Each of these women could be dead today. Instead, they prove it is possible to escape an abusive relationship and rebuild self-esteem. They shared their secrets to show other victims there is hope for a better life on the other side.
