A faded color photograph is my sole relic from the days I spent in Meridian, Mississippi. Creases span the worn surface, and smudges stain the yellowing border, hinting at its age. Creases span the worn surface, and smudges stain the yellowing border, hinting at its age. The date printed on the top border, May ’67, confirms it.

In the photograph, my twenty-two-year-old self leans against a red Camaro, smiling. I’m wearing an outfit I made on my Singer sewing machine: a short-sleeved, white blouse and a straight, red skirt that hits just above the knee. A red ribbon ties my then-dark hair up and back, and white three-inch heels encase my feet, one foot slightly ahead of the other in a kind of fashion-model pose.

The cherry red of the Camaro almost matches that of my skirt. A sign atop the car shouts, “The Girl from Coca-Cola is Here! Hundreds of chances to win $10-$35!” Looking at that old photo of myself, I see a version of me, a version that can’t know all that experience has taught me these many years since. The 1960s in the Deep South held almost unimaginable turmoil—hate, fear, violence. Yet possibility somehow lay in the mix. The possibility that the country really could do better in fulfilling its founding promise of equal opportunity for all its citizens. But who was I then? And how did that person find her way to being the current me?

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