The Law According to Moses: Time to Buck Up
By Ambrose Moses, III
As a young child growing up in Atlanta, I walked to and from school with my older cousins. One day after school, I stood at the corner where we were supposed to meet and waited for them. I waited and waited and waited. All the other kids walked past. Finally, there was no one there but me. Where were my cousins? I got that lump in my throat and began to cry. No one heard my cries. I felt alone, terrified, and didn’t know what to do. Eventually, I looked left-right-left, stepped off the curb, and headed home.
I came to that busy street with the traffic light and the phone booth (remember those?). How was I supposed to cross the street? Someone had always held my hand and told me to watch the light and to watch out for traffic. What was I to do? I walked over to the phone booth, but I could barely reach the phone, had no money, and didn’t know the telephone number to the house because I had never had to call home before.
I went back to the corner with the light. By this time I had stopped crying. I waited for the light to turn red, looked left-right-left (just as I had done countless times when holding someone else’s hand), and crossed the street. From there, it was smooth sailing to the house. As I got close to the house, I started running and for some reason I started crying again as I called out for my mother. She came to the door and greeted me with a hug and a smile as I told her of my ordeal.
Minutes later, my cousins walked in laughing and telling their version of what had happened. As it turned out, this was all planned to test me and to teach me how to walk home alone. My cousins were watching me the entire time. After they stopped rolling on the floor with laughter about me and the phone booth with no money and no telephone number, it was agreed that I had passed the test.
During recent months, we have lost mentors, role models, and advocates who have taught us, paved the way for us, and fought for us. We never planned or knew when we would have to walk alone. But, if they were as great as we know and believe them to be, they taught us well. Like my cousins, they are watching over us. We must now buck up, look left-right-left, and continue our journey.
For more information contact
Ambrose Moses, III, an attorney with Moses Law Office. Email: info@MosesLaw.pro. Telephone: (614) 418-7898.
