“Even though our visits to Baltimore were a part of Mama’s grand design, I enjoyed them. I loved Baltimore itself, with its clanging streetcars, funny-looking people, lamplights, pigeons, and ice cream cones. I loved to sit out on the marble stoop after dinner and watch the teeming parade of street life; I always had a nickel in my pocket just in case the organ-grinder came by with his monkey, who wore a little green coat with brass buttons. I loved my sweet, refined grandmother in her dim, high-ceilinged row house with lace at the windows and doilies on the tables. She always referred to my late grandfather with great respect, often making such statements as, “Mr. Marshall raised trotters, you know,” or, “Mr. Marshall loved oysters in any form.” This deference enchanted me.”

-Lee Smith, for Garden & Gun magazine