Exploration two Annie Stevens

1. The profiled person I admire the most in Holding On is Moreese Bickham. Not because he shot two police officers but because he fought in a time when many could only lay down and die. He stood up for his common-law wife after she hit him over the head with a bottle. Who knows what the police would have done to her if he had stood back and let them take her. The police sounded like pretty shady charters. Back then most women, especially black women were seen as objects. I think there is a good possibility she could have been raped or killed by the police. He lost everything in that moment, even before he killed the officers. Living in a place where the Klan made the rules he knew he was in for it.
Though he lost everything (his family) he continues to "live" in prison. Many would go insane in his shoes. He has found roses to "keep him company" and he continues to fight for his freedom even moments before his death sentence would be carried out and put on hold. It would be interesting to see how he did "on the outside". Many long term prisoners can't take the "noise of freedom" and commit petty crimes to return to prison. I hope he found some happiness.

2. It surprises me that he sees that he is a workaholic. Addicts tend to minimize their addictions. He seams open to the fact that he is, and it is affecting his children. He really doesn't say how he wants to change, or if he is working to help relieve the guilt his son feels.  Writing seams to be therapy for him. Maybe it would help his son to read his work and learn to write about his emotions himself. Grief and guilt are the two worse emotions, I feel, children experience. It burdens them and is non productive.

Passage: "my own son, at the age of ten, is taking on the griefs of the world" "He tells me that when I am gripped with sadness he feels responsible."

3. Question: what do you gain from continuing to hold on to (whatever they hold on to)?