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Sixteen black women and three white women are sitting in a room filled by a piano, a podium, and two foldable long tables with metal chairs. The floor is white cement tile, sparkling clean, and dry. Outside, the parking lot, which is being paved, is turned into quickmud. Tractors buried to the middle of their treads loom with the backdrop of razor wire and chain-link fencing. Soaking wet, the red mud makes it smell like the earth is bleeding. Inside, it's orientation for basic schooling and career preparation. The white women, all three of them instructors, are expounding upon the need for a proper attitude and the ability to manage one's time and anger in order to be successful. One offers GED training. One offers Life Management skills. The last offers comfort in using a computer. The students are barely varied in appearance. All of them are female, and all of them are black. Two of them got pregnant and dropped out of school to care for their children. The first became diabetic during her pregnancy just before her senior year in high school, and was forced to deliver her baby at six months. Premature, his lungs had not developed properly, and his ailments meant he was destined to spend the first year or so of his life in the hospital. He still has some problems, his mother says, but he'll get along.
Approximate Word count = 924
Approximate Pages = 3.7
(250 words per page double spaced)
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