Pulitzer Prize winner Anne Hull grew up in a Florida unblemished by Disney or malls or condos, when the Strawberry Festival parade was still the biggest event of the year.
Photo Illustration by Erin O’Flynn/The Daily Beast/Getty Images and State Library and Archives of Florida
It was a revelation of major import. I’d been downtown once, by car, with my mother to buy light bulbs at McCrory’s. I had never seen such a place. A lady in uniform was tending a popcorn machine. There were two aisles of toys, heavy on the pistols and light on the dolls. Balloons were strung over the lunch counter. I had heard at school that inside each balloon was a folded-up piece of paper scrawled with a number.
“You know to look both ways before you cross,” he said, holding on to my bike handle. “And when you see people, speak to them. This is your town.” The Girl Scouts met at the Brownie Hut in Plant City. I wanted a house like the Brownie Hut. It was made of logs and it had a fireplace and smelled of woodsmoke. The refrigerator was stocked with jugs of fruit punch and Girl Scout cookies, and inside the door was a bottle of Mylanta in case anyone got a sour stomach. What else did you need?
Miss Jackie had instructed us to meet her at the JSOD float near Kilgore Seed and to arrive ready—hair, face, tights, the works. At home I’d stood in the bathroom stiff as a board while my mother dug around in her makeup drawers for lipstick and blush. She sat on the edge of the white claw-foot tub. Think of it as Halloween, she said, without the Pink Panther costume. She tried to keep a straight face as she applied my lipstick. I drew the line at eye shadow.
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