Free Chicken Soup for the African American Woman's Soul by Jack Canfield

to complete Dancing in the Kitchen , one thing is for sure. It will be a tribute to our mother and grandmother, and the opening selection will be by the Shirelles—“Dedicated to the One I Love.”
    Barbara Holt

History Through Herstory
    T here is black history untold in the memories of the hundreds of grandmothers, grandfathers, great-aunts.
    Alex Haley
    Thirty years ago on a hot summer afternoon my mother and I left home early one Saturday morning to spend the day going to tag sales, the New England equivalent of garage sales. My father looked at us with a pained expression on his face and said for the umpteenth time, “Do not bring any more junk in this house.” We promptly ignored him and walked out the door. Mom taught me to leave things in the trunk of the car and to bring tag sale purchases in the house little by little.
    That bright, sunny day we drifted down winding country lanes stopping at every tag sale we spotted. We stopped at a lovely old country mansion. The woman in charge had lost her mother and was trying to sell a lifetime of her mother’s treasures, a yard full of beautiful antiques that I am sure her mother had cherished. A large antique sideboard caught my mother’s eye, but we knew we could not get it in the car or slide it past Dad. We went from room to room filled with the flotsam and jetsam of bygone days. It brought tears to my eyes to see those well-loved items scattered about looking a bit lonely and unloved. Just as we were ready to leave empty handed, the owner said, “Did you look upstairs? You might find something you like up there.” We ducked our heads and took a cramped staircase up to a stuffy room under the eaves; the room was filled with all kinds of dolls. I stood there simply enchanted.
    On a dusty shelf in one corner of the room I spotted two old black composition dolls. It was love at first sight. The girl doll was dressed in a handmade red velvet dress with a beautiful matching bonnet. Alas, the boy doll was naked as a jaybird. I gently picked them up and cuddled them in my arms. Tossed on a table in the corner I spotted an elegant island doll with the name “Cindie Jamaica B.W.I.” on her apron. I spotted a tiny hand-carved doll tucked in a basket on the floor and added her to my arms. I quickly paid for all of my treasures. If I had known then what I know now, I would have bought every doll in that room. A lifelong hobby as a black-doll collector was born on that day; I was hooked in a mighty big way.
    Somehow, holding these dolls in my hands now, dolls that had dark skin and black hair, dolls that looked like my friends and my family, dolls that were beautiful—beautiful and black —filled a void in my heart from my childhood when my mother could not find any black dolls for me to play with. I remember my two Toni dolls, one with blond hair and one a brunette. They did not have a black Toni doll. I did not have any dolls that looked like me.
    The next thirty years took me on an endless quest to countless yard sales, flea markets, antique shops and antique malls looking for black dolls. I learned to wheel and deal with the best of them. My mantra was, “Is that your best price? I must have that doll for my grandbaby.”
    I had another bargain and another black doll. I had dreams of one day having a black doll museum.
    Over the years I have amassed more than four hundred black dolls, and I love each and every one of them. Many times people ask me if I sell any of my dolls, and I tell them they are all my children; would you sell your children? I loved each doll I brought home as if I had given birth to it myself.
    My favorite dolls are old black rag dolls. The first rag doll I purchased was a topsy-turvy doll made with a white doll on one end, and when you pull her skirt over her head, the doll on the other side is black, and each doll’s clothing is different. The owner said it was made in the late 1800s by a little