shared variable between PerlChildInitHandler and PerlResponseHandler

Hi, all:
I am trying to load a configuration file into a hash during my 
PerlChildInitHandler and then access the values from PerlResponseHandler. 
However, even though the process number is the same, it seems that variables 
changed during the child_init() call revert back to their default values when 
handler() gets called.

The basic scenario is:


package StartupLog;

# the variable I'm testing
my $sticky = 0;

sub child_init {
    $sticky = 1;
    return 0;
}

sub handler {
    warn __PACKAGE__ . " sticky = $sticky\n";    ### always says "0" but should 
say "1"
    return 0;
}
1;

I've been tearing my hair out for hours on this one. Is this something intrinsic 
to mod_perl that I'm overlooking? I can't find any good examples of loading a 
config during the PerlChildInit, even though that seems like the best time for 
me to load it. 


Thank you for any help,
/m