What Things Last

Celina Ottaway's series, continued:



MOTHERLAND TIME AND DISTANCE -- AND EVEN A WAR -- DON'T DIMINISH A PARENT'S LOVE

Sunday, May 9, 1999



CELINA OTTAWAY Staff writer



Lawuo Stevens could lose herself in the quick rhythm of her wrists, up down, up down, and on for hours in her little beauty parlor on Central Avenue in Albany, a city where it snowed in the winter and the wind blew a chill that stung her sun-soaked African bones.



She would braid her customers' hair so fast that her finger movements were a mystery. It was easier to watch her wrists. Flick, flick as braid after braid flowed from her palms, like a magician pulling scarves from an empty hand.



For seven years,…