Dear Marguerite (Maya), I must say, we have been through a lot. I commend you for your strength, ambition and courage. The things that I can attest to seeing are beautiful and quite gruesome as well. But I enjoyed seeing us grow in to this beautiful butterfly. The process of metamorphosis wasn't smooth and easy, although, I enjoy looking back and seeing how the things that occurred molded me into who I am. All of the abuse of our past should have been told to someone immediately. Thank God someone found out who had done it as soon after it had happened. I understand why it wasn't told to anyone; having someone tell you that all of your loved ones who would be killed will induce fear upon many. The trauma from this experienced caused me to be very leery of strange men, perhaps just people in general. We have seen a great deal of things, might I add once more. Being a part of magnificent and grand situations changed my perspectives. Some lacking the same amount of enthusiasm which sets the two different categories of magnificent to grand apart from one another. The admiration we had for Bailey was unbelieveable! He was my right-hand-man. He was the man of any young girls dream. My brother was handsome, intelligent and to top it all off he had the skin of a dark midnight, as smooth and the rhythm of blues. Bailey was able to get away with everything. He was able to go out and play with other children, while I stayed under mama: The total dork. I was almost The valedictorian of my graduating class and received a scholarship to college. As a child all I could do was read, read, and read some more. I read more than most children at the age of five. Besides my abuse, which had taken my every bit of my confidence away, I would confide in a nice, warm, and inviting book, Living in the South didn't make it any better. My own brother witnessed a lynching and was almost thrown into jail for no good reason at all. I constantly compared myself to