All that winter I got up at 5:45 a.m. and left to open the kitchen.
The Mendacious Kitchen was the only place I felt relaxed. When I got in
I made myself porridge and ate it. I chopped vegetables. I wore a white
paper hat over my greasy hair. I did
my work well and I listened to Winston.
Winston told me he had grown up in Washington DC. He laughed - a high
pitched laugh that trilled sardonically. People said this city was
tough, but Winston said that living in Washington was like living in the
ocean - big fish ate the little fish just for walking down the road.
It was hard,
especially for someone like him who was Black but looked white. Winston was
a little chubby, liquid-eyed, curly-haired, a smattering of beard, an
unplaceable accent, olive skin. Early on, gently relishing my confusion,
he'd asked me what race I thought he was. People always struggled to
locate him racially and
plumped quite often for Portuguese.
Winston had moved to Chicago as a teenager and joined a gang. I couldn't tell
if he was amused by my gullibility or just by my astonishment as he
told me stories of gun-slinging in the streets - standing facing other
gangs, guns blazing. His gang
name was Will Kill. Winston always wished he'd been named Die Hard. When
I asked why, he said he thought the name Die Hard meant that you would
be hard to kill.
Other memories jogged by this photo.
Further memories .
This Photo.
All the Photos
Photos in Chronological Order
Map/Diagram of Story Elements