Langston Hughes 'Short Story Salvation'

In Langston Hughes short story Salvation, he reminiscences about his Auntie Reed’s churches attempt to “save” him at the age of twelve. The preacher holds a distinctive affair for the children which he calls “bringing the young lambs to the fold.” Each child sits on a mourner’s bench and slowly but surely each one stands, are received by the preacher, and subsequently saved by Jesus. Langston observes while all his peers stand up and are saved, while he sits and waits for Jesus to truly reveal himself; however, he is dumbfounded when another boy named Wesley blasphemes and is not subsequently struck dead. Langston had sat at the mourner’s bench for a considerable amount of time and was badgered by the grinning Wesley who sat proudly on the platform above. Reluctantly, he rose to join his peers

The peer pressure I experienced in my early childhood through my brother and his friends was more along the lines of, “are you brave enough to swim across that pond or be the first to try out the makeshift zipline we created?” That zipline story actually occurred and when that line broke I received a swift lesson about gravity and wound up shattering my left elbow. I ended up having reconstructive surgery on my elbow and had to wear an enormous cast for six months. Do you think that taught me the hazards of giving in to peer pressure? Nope. This pressure continued through high school and the technical college I attended; although, it mainly manifested through alcohol consumption and the poor decisions that followed. I no longer engage in the social behaviors that my friends and family think that I should abide by. I stopped drinking alcohol and started eating a whole-food plant based diet much to their disbelief. I received untold amounts of criticism for adopting this healthy lifestyle; however, it opened my eyes to people’s insecurities about