The Whip and the Bee: Diary from the Grape Strike

Los Angeles, 1967

I pronounce it like FDR’s middle name, and the man at the Greyhound ticket window stares at me. “The bus don’t stop at no place like that!”

“You sure?” He nods, and then I spell it out, “D-E-L -A-N-O!”

“De-lay-no. That’s different. Sure, we got a 6:30 bus goin’ there.”

I buy a one-way ticket and start looking for a place to sit. It is close to midnight, but the bus station is still crowded. There is no room on the wooden benches for stretching out, so I prop my feet on my duffle bag and hunch down in a corner. I am half asleep when two cops come by and ask to see my ticket. They barely look at it...