Every weekday, with the exception of holidays and during the summer, a woman boards a city bus on Charleston's West Side and heads across town, twice a day, to Kanawha City. Her name is Marsha Berry, and she carries a badge.
She won't be making any arrests, but she will be protecting and serving. Her destination is Horace Mann Middle School, where she stands her post as a city crossing guard.
Her corner is located at MacCorkle Avenue and 43rd Street, in front of the school, but she likes to call her corner the 34th Street Miracle. "It's where beautiful things happen," Berry says.
The beautiful things to which she refers may not seem like miracles to all, as small as they are, but to Berry there is little doubt. She suffers no strangers on her corner, anyone who walks or rides a bike past receives a greeting. It seems everyone knows Marsha.
Her real time to shine comes when the yellow warning lights begin to blink on MacCorkle and her kids run from inside the school.
"I always have a peace sign for my motorists and a fist pump for my kids," Berry said, "and if I forget, they let me know it."
For the past 23 years, Berry has shepherded two generations of her flock across the bustling lanes of Kanawha City.
"Once you are a mother and grandmother to your own kids, you are to everyone's kids."