Ball high and outside, for Ball 1. The crowd cheered. Terrence received the ball back, checked the sign, and delivered again. Called strike on the ou...side corner, evening the count at one. Just as quickly as the crowd had erupted with cheers, they fell nervously silent. Ricardo White took a lead from first. Terrence checked White out of the corner of his eye. He quickly made a throw to first, but White beat the throw back to the base. The crowd vocalized their disdain, wanting Terrence to. ”James closed his eyes, he searched for and found the quotation.“James?”“The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place, and I don’t care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!”“And you. . ordaughter now." Mom ... thanks," I felt my eyes were getting a bit misty."Hush, don't cry now. You don't want to have panda eyes, doyou?" Mom hugged my shoulders tenderly.Dad let out a sigh and said, "I think that settles it." Hesteered the wagon out of the parking lane and continued ourjourney.It was all bumpy roads and dirt tracks for the last half hour ofthe trip. I remembered I used to play with my cousins andfriends among these fields when I was younger. We moved to thebig city when Dad. It was shocking that Treva had only been with a white woman once and Isiah had never had a white woman. They seemed to know exactly how to please me and how to push my buttons. I thought they were experienced experts at interracial sex.The conversation turned to that very subject for the next twenty minutes. How exciting it was for all of us to be with a person outside of our race and how it made the good sex better. All three of us made confessions about knowing people who would object to us.