(Dr. Joye Pugh, author) Everyone knows life is filled with ups and downs. My life has been richly blessed by the closeness of family and friends. I am so lucky and I thank God for the people He always sent my way to fill my days with more sunshine than rain. When storm clouds would gather around, it always seemed each storm, no matter how bad, ended in a rainbow. Looking for the stepping stones to find the path God designated for my life has not always been an easy task. Just like everyone else I, too, have stumbled and fell. In the South we call that experience, Òfalling off the turnip truck.Ó

(Dr. Joye Pugh, author) Everyone knows life is filled with ups and downs. My life has been richly blessed by the closeness of family and friends. I am so lucky and I thank God for the people He always sent my way to fill my days with more sunshine than rain. When storm clouds would gather around, it always seemed each storm, no matter how bad, ended in a rainbow. Looking for the stepping stones to find the path God designated for my life has not always been an easy task. Just like everyone else I, too, have stumbled and fell. In the South we call that experience, "falling off the turnip truck."

Benny Andrews loved to draw. He drew his nine brothers and sisters, and his parents. He drew the red earth of the fields where they all worked, the hot sun that beat down, and the rows and rows of crops. As Benny hauled buckets of water, he made pictures in his head. And he dreamed of a better life—something beyond the segregation, the backbreaking labor, and the limited opportunities of his world. Benny’s dreams took him far from the rural Georgia of his childhood. He became one of the most important African American painters of the twentieth century, and he opened doors for other artists of color. His story will inspire budding young artists to work hard and follow their dreams.

…When I left the small hotel in the Montparnase section of Paris to enter the taxi I’d booked with the desk clerk the night before to take me to the Charles DeGaulle airport north of the city, I paused on the sidewalk and considered: Do I have all of my luggage? Yes. And my ticket and passport? Yes. Am I doing the right thing? Will this man be the right one . . . or perhaps I’m making another wrong turn on my road through life? But my last question went unanswered in my mind as I watched the driver put my bags in the trunk, then I began my journey to America. And to Jim…

Nigerian girl and the oldest a sixty-five-year-old retired African American telephone operator.