As published on aljazeera.com

McIntosh, Alabama – Andy Lang, dressed all in black and wearing a cap, is on Highway 43, heading to McIntosh High School. Like Lang, most of the town’s 250 residents graduated from the school and today many are gathering there for the homecoming parade. As the car heads south towards the school, it passes a turnoff that leads to the sprawling sites of the two chemical and pesticide-producing companies residents say have left a lasting mark on this small community.

As published on salvationsouth.com

The red taillights of my brother’s camper receded out of the driveway. I swallowed my tears as Billy’s sinewy arm gave a last-minute wave out his window before disappearing. My mother and I turned to walk back into our kitchen, which, at the time, was painted an electric yellow. It was the late 1970s. I was fourteen, and Billy, eight years older than me, had been living on the road since he was a teenager.

As published on al.com

You were our coaches, teachers, Boy Scout leaders, preachers, future politicians. You were neighbors, family friends, family members, always charming and trusted with our care. You took us on detours after practice on the way home, you snuck us into empty classrooms, equipment rooms, and offices on school campus. You found ways into our tents on camp outs and our bedrooms and basements at home. You cruised the malls where we spent hours shopping at The Limited and hanging out at the food court. You groomed us. You targeted us. You sexually assaulted us.

As published on salvationsouth.com

…it took me until middle age to accept that trying to fix someone, much less a place like a restaurant, is a compulsion as destructive as an addict’s substance abuse. I know because I spent an entire lifetime trying to rehabilitate my family’s farmhouse — the home I grew up in — just southeast of Birmingham, Alabama.

As published on aljazeera.com

When Cara McClure was in elementary school, every year at Thanksgiving, the school delivered a box of food and a certificate for Buster Brown shoes to needy families in their small community of Powderly, on the west side of Birmingham, Alabama.

As published on salvationsouth.com

Ernestine Cromwell is the self-described “militant black woman” who rides herd over the 105 members of Alabama’s House of Representatives. She is feared. She is beloved. She is one of a kind.

As published on latimes.com

I had never imagined my own murder until one morning in January at the small church my husband and I attend in northern Alabama. I am sitting in the back pew in the small church the Sunday after Epiphany. A man with a military-style haircut opens the front door. The service is almost over. He smiles at me over his face mask as he quietly closes the door.

As published on al.com

Wendy Montealegre stood in the pouring rain. She could see the chained-up dogs a concerned neighbor had called her about. She could also see puppies in a crate nearby. “Get off my property or I’ll call the police,” a woman yelled at her.

As published on al.com

Eighty-nine-year-old Mildred Duke, a widow who grew up in Gallion, Alabama, has lived most of her life in one place, the house she’s called home since she was married in 1951. Several weeks ago, she was mowing grass in her front yard when men in yellow vests drove up in a truck.

Gabby Petito was strangled to death. Strangulation can lead to loss of consciousness in seconds and death in just minutes. This is why it’s considered a huge red flag on the continuum of domestic violence assessment and represents a very thin line between life and death for the victim.

As published on al.com

Victims of officer involved domestic violence live with the unrelenting fear and anxiety of knowing their abuser always carries a gun on his hip. They go to sleep and wake up knowing their partner has instant access to a gun.

As published on The Bitter Southerner

My life story has been defined by the place my family has called home for four generations. Referred to as the “McCullough house” by my mother’s generation, it is one of the oldest in Birmingham.

As published on AL.com

Megan Montgomery’s murder at the hands of her estranged husband has left her family, friends, and community heartbroken. Another woman has died because a manipulative, violent man she knew and loved believed he had the right to control her.

As published on The Bitter Southerner

As a young boy, Johnnie Johnson Jr. fled down alleys and hid behind bushes whenever he spied a policeman. But one day, as he waited for the school bus, a policeman stopped his patrol car, and Johnson decided to stay put. The white officer rolled down his window and said, “Come here, son.”

As published on scalawagmagazine.org

For more than a year, Erica Robbins, founder of Be A Blessing Birmingham, had been trying to raise money for portable showering stations for the city’s homeless.

As published on The Bitter Southerner

When my mother, now 83, asked me to drive her to see Frank who is recuperating at a physical rehabilitation facility two hours away in Huntsville, she says, “The only reason I’m asking is I know you won’t let me drive alone on the highway.”

As published on AL.com

As we navigate different stages of re-opening and rising waves of infection, the loss and uncertainty of this pandemic feels as if we’re forever in a loved one’s closet sifting through the remnants of their lives after the funeral. Our former way of life still haunts us, much like the death of someone we love, but the way we used to live and grieve has seemingly vanished.

As published on AL.com

When it comes to domestic violence, most of us assume it doesn’t happen in our neighborhood, and if it does, it’s easier to look away. But during the past two months, calls to the YWCA’s domestic violence hotline in Birmingham have doubled.