“Yes,” she finally said, nodding, staring off into her past, gathering the evidence that supported her fear. “Yeah, if I’m gone be honest with you, I have to say that I am.”
I guess I expected that answer, but at the same time I was surprised to hear it. I never thought she was afraid of anything.
“Why should you be afraid?” I asked. “Everybody says white people in town respect you more than any other black person.”
“Huh,” she replied with a disbelieving laugh. “If they respects Jennie Lowe, it’s ’cause she old and set in her ways. They figures they ain’t got nothing to worry about from her.”
She became indignant at that thought and tapped her hands angrily against each other in her lap.
“Why is I afraid? I tell you why.” She pointed out the window. “’Cause they controls everything. With the snap of they fingers”—and she snapped hers—“they can change who you is and who you gone be for the rest of your life.”
“Is it really that easy for them?”
Of course, I knew it was, but I guess I hoped I’d be surprised by her answer.
“Who you thank you talking to?” she asked.
I didn’t understand where she was going. I thought I had upset her even more.
“You mean, you?” I asked, pointing to her.
“Yeah, me.”
“Mama Jennie. My great-grandmother.”
“Well, you got it half right anyhow. The right part being the last part.”
“I don’t understand.”
“My name is Cora. Cora Lowe. It ain’t Jennie.”
My eyes widened.
“I guess you feel like you don’t know who you been talking to all these years. Like you been deceived. Sometimes I be feeling that way ’bout myself,” she continued.
“How?”
“Well, like you know, I won’t born no slave, thanks be to the good Lord. Just missed it. But my folks stayed on the plantation for a good bit afterwards, and the white folks still treated us like slaves. Give us a piece of money now and then, but it ain’t amount to much. Colored folks began to take pride in the little thangs that come with they freedom. Thangs like naming they own children. So that’s why my mama ain’t wait for the missus to name me. She called me Cora. But my papa, he told me that the missus come down to see the new baby, me, that is, and they told her my name. But she say, ‘I’ll call her Jennie. Don’t y’all think that’s a good name for a nigra girl?’ Jennie, by the way, was a regular name they give to mules back then. What that tell you?
“Papa say ain’t nothing they could do but nod they heads, and I been who I ain’t really been from that point on. They ain’t much different about the names. One could be a slave name as well as the other, but I reckon it say something ’bout control when it comes down to people telling you who you is and what you all ’bout, naming your children and stuff. That old woman, she come down to the house and branded me as sure as I was a damn cow or something. Umph.”
“Why don’t you go back to ‘Cora,’ then? Be who you were supposed to be?”
“The damage already done, chile. Inside and out. Ain’t worth thanking ’bout.”
I handed her another napkin, and she dabbed the corners of her eyes.
“Do you think any white people are a little afraid of what’s happening?”
“They built that academy, didn’t they? And the ones who can’t afford to go there probably afraid they children gone get beat up. That they happy little nigras gone turn out to be not so happy, and the colored children gone have too many chances to get some revenge. They probably afraid they little white girls gone be falling for the colored boys, and that ain’t nothing new. I could tell you some stories, and maybe I will someday. And most of all, I reckon they afraid to tackle that old myth they been talking up lo these many centuries.”
“You mean that blacks aren’t born as smart as white folks?”
“That be the one. I reckon more than a few of ’em is thanking, what if it ain’t true? What if the niggers got brains after all?” She chuckled a little. “You know what they says. Hard to keep ’em down on the farm then.”
“I think some of us are afraid of that myth, too.”
“Naturally. They been brainwashed. I know plenty of colored folks what believe that. Yeah, chile. Lots of them. They thank that we ain’t up to snuff in the book department just like the white folks be thanking. They probably afraid that going up against the white chillen will prove that they is dumb. They wants to believe that they is as smart as any white folks, but you know in they hearts they ain’t completely sure. Some would rather stay home and not find out for sure.”
“Do you think it’s true?”
“No, baby. Course not. They ain’t born with no more sense in they heads than us. I know that. I done some mammy work in my day. Remember Dr. King and all them other Negro men and women what changed this entire country? Don’t you thank they outsmarted a few of these crackers along the way?”
“I guess so.”
“Sure they did . . . You want some iced tea?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“It’s out there on the porch, brewing in the sun.”
She continued as she pulled glasses from the cupboard, sweetened the tea, added ice from the refrigerator and poured.
“It ain’t what you born with, but what you be exposed to,” she said, handing me a glass.
“That’s what I thought—I mean, about being exposed. But I heard Miss Chauncey Mae say at the session that being exposed to what the white man might be teaching us is gonna do the opposite. That it’s gonna put us in a worse position than before.”
“I suppose I see a little logic in that, but it don’t hold enough water for me. You always got to be on the lookout for getting brainwashed, but you can’t stop studying ’cause of that.”
“Rosetta and Eugenia say they aren’t gonna study anything they try to teach them.”
“Well, that’s just plain stupid. What they gone stop studying for? What do they thank they been studying before anyway? It was all from books written by white folks about white folks. We just got to teach our children to read between the lines.” She shook her head in disgust. “When folks get carried away about something, the first thang they do is stop thanking right.”
“Why do you think they’d cut off their noses to spite their faces?”
“I reckon it goes back to what I said ’bout the myth. And I guess it’s ’cause they hates the white people so much, they don’t want to have nothing to do with ’em. It’s just like I said, though. You can’t escape ’em even if you don’t go to school or church with ’em. Just being alive puts you in touch with ’em. You paying ’em when you pay your bills, they build your house for you if you can afford one, you gots to shop at they stores, you drive the cars they be building. Just ain’t no way to get ’round it. Might as well let some of that evilness out and go on and deal with the devil as he is.”
“I think it’s right and all, the integration. But I’m still afraid.”
“Rightly so, I guess.”
“What can you tell me about white people? You know, about what to watch out for. What do you know about ’em?”
“Chile, I don’t know nothing ’bout ’em really. I been around ’em a lot, but all I know is how to gets around ’em, to sweet-talk ’em up and get what I wants out of ’em. Most colored folks know that. I can tell right away how much rebellishness each one of ’em might have in ’em, and how to deal with that accordingly. But I don’t know nothing ’bout who they really is. The only thang you can predict ’bout ’em is that they probably ain’t gone be treating you like family,” she said, chuckling.
I told her how weak I felt going in, like the underdog in a prizefight. I told her how I kept reaching for something stable to hold onto to give me some strength, but that I couldn’t find it. I told her how I had read my textbooks from cover to cover, but how I still didn’t feel confident. I explained that I kept looking over my shoulder for s
omething, some precedent on which to base my choice of how to enter this battle.
“I know what you mean, son,” she said. “I know exactly what you looking for, but we all got a big hole in our past. A big emptiness. Like I said, I just missed them bullwhip days, but Lord, Lord I can hear the echoes of leather cracking against dark backs. Umph!” she said, unconsciously wrapping her arms around herself. “Chile, I can feel it in my bones. I always could. It’s in your bones, too. I thank you feeling it a little now, too.
“You hear it when you need to feel some pride and you look back for something to draw on like the white folks do. They be saying thangs like, ‘I’m descended from George Washington’ or one of them rebel soldiers which I ain’t gone dirty up my mouth with they names. ‘My great-grandfather was a great general in the Civil War; he signed the Constitution.’ That gives ’em pride to stand on. When colored folks looks back, all they sees is a string of slaves in chains. Chattel. All of a sudden, they pride is gone, chile. Just like water through your fingers. You say, why it got to be this way? And you start to hear them bullwhips a-cracking.”
I thought of Daddy getting whipped by those two white men.
“What if they beat up on me?” I asked.
“They just do.”
“Can’t anybody do anything about it?”
“Like what? And who? Shoot, all I can say is that I’ll be there for you when your wounds need tending to, whether it be wounds of the body or the heart. That’s all the comfort I can gives you. You in a different time than me, dealing with stuff I don’t nothing ’bout. Pretty soon, you gone be beyond Jennie Lowe.”
“I think I’m also afraid that I’ll lose my dignity.”
“Dignity! Ha! I don’t reckon you hear too many Negroes my age or your mama and daddy’s age that use that word too much. It conjures up all kinds of bad situations and thoughts. All the dignity we got is in our own community. But that ain’t no good. A thang like that is useless unless it’s respected through all communities. You can’t have dignity in just a little section of society without having it in the whole shebang. And we lose a little bit of that every time we got to go up against some cracker. When that happens you realize that it just ain’t complete.
“Just the other day, I was with yo’ mama shopping in the grocery store. Ole man Thompson was in there with his little great-granddaughter. I don’t reckon she no more than seven, and she was drinking some juice. She took one look at yo’ mama and throwed the juice right on your mama’s dress. Then she say, ‘Nigger bitch.’ Folks turning all ’round looking at us and stuff. Ole man Thompson just smiled like she just finished a piano recital or something. Now, it really hurts when a child does it to you.
“You always want to knock somebody upside the head when they calls you names and thangs, but then you feels guilty for thanking about how you wants to beat that child to death. You look at something so innocent, and this vile mess comes out. It stays with you. You know that this child is just a seed of hate that’s gone sprout more branches of hatred while she grows. With a whole another generation of that staring you in the face, how you figure you can hold on to some kind of dig-ni-ty?”
The story made me feel bad for Mama, and for my future.
“I keep hoping that the racists are all old and dying out. That only a few might be left.”
“Don’t be holding your breath on that one,” she said. “Racists is like roaches. Where they is one, they is a thousand.”
“Well, that wasn’t what I needed to hear,” I replied. “I have a whole life to live next to these people.”
“Like many peoples before you, with you, and after you.”
“While we’re talking about it, you know I read somewhere that if there is one of those nuclear explosions, one of the few things left living will be roaches. Now, you say racists will be around, too.”
She laughed. “That is bad, ain’t it? Roaches ain’t deserving of such company.”
We both laughed.
“I don’t know,” I said, coming down from the laughter. “I guess I just wish I could understand them a little bit. I’d feel better going in.”
“Wish I could help you, but I don’t understand ’em, neither. I just know the range of white folks, from the paddy rollers to the Klan, and to them what helped with the civil rights. A Negro needs to be able to tell the difference so they’ll know who to go to in the times of strife. Sometimes seem like your life depends on knowing which type of white folks is which. But as far as knowing what it’s really like to be white, how they see the world, hell, don’t even waste your time. We can’t do that no more than a man can know what it is to birth a baby.”
“It’s too much,” I said, overwhelmed by it all. “Maybe people were right. Maybe Eliza Blizzard was wrong. Why go into it just to have to deal with more grief? I wonder if an education is any good to us anyway.”
“Look at it this way. Ain’t no need not to try. You ain’t got nothing to lose. If you try hard and you still don’t get nowhere, well, it ain’t no skin offa yo’ back. You still be where you at. Just a little bit smarter.
“Education ain’t all just about what’s in them books,” she continued. “Going to school with them white chillen will help you get to know ’em better. And if it’s gone be that thangs ain’t gone get no better, at least you know something ’bout the enemy you didn’t know the day before, and that can’t be bad. It helps to know a little bit about the devil in your life. You gone have a royal opportunity that all us ole folks never dreamed of.”
“Thank you, Mama Jennie. I’m glad I’ve got you to talk to. Daddy’s still mad at me, and Mama can’t make up her mind.”
“We going back to that dignity problem. Your daddy confused. He feel like he the daddy and you the child. So, in his head, you need to honor and follow his words. He can’t get it out of his head that you still on this somebody kick. When he look at you, he see a boy that ain’t got no respect for his daddy. The white man don’t respect him, and he thank his son don’t either. But the deal is that he need to open his mind and put his children before his pride. Your mama, she just afraid of things coming apart. I done talked to her two times already. Calmed her down. Last time I told her that she better be looking out for you. If she don’t, I’m gone have to come out to that farmhouse and throw down!”
We both had a long laugh, and I leaned over and gave her a big hug.
•••
That night before school began, Mama held Mark until his tears had dried up. When he finally came to bed, he fell right to sleep.
The next day, Mark and I stood side by side. I was going into sixth grade and he into tenth. We watched the big yellow school bus come down the road toward us. He looked down at me, and neither of us spoke. No need. We knew what the deal was—that no matter what had gone before, we were family. We were up against the greatest evil in our lives, and we had to stick together.
The bus stopped, and thankfully the driver was black.
“Come on in, children,” she said, attempting a comforting smile. But I could tell that comfortable was the last thing she was feeling or could help others to feel. I knew this woman, Mrs. Cotton, through my parents. I knew the cadence of her speech, the way she normally held her head, the way her smile normally looked. It was all out of whack. She was working so hard at her saying her words the way white people talk. I guess she had been doing it all morning, trying not to let the white parents or children think badly of her. I understood.
I walked onto the bus behind Mark. Although I had expected them, the white faces confused and disoriented me. Mark turned and whispered, “I feel it, too.”
I nodded and moved down the aisle. Practically all the seats were taken. Mark took a seat next to two black kids. The only empty seat left was one next to a young white boy. I looked at the seat and at him and waited for him to slide over. He just stared back at me like he was in shock. Mark pulled me to him and squeezed me into the seat beside him.
“You know what?” I ask
ed.
“What?”
“I think he was afraid of me.”
“I know,” Mark said. “Bojack said that white people are as scared of us as we are of them when it’s one on one. They think all black people carry knives.”
•••
I was placed into what used to be the white middle school. For me it was like going into the Canaan library again for the first time. Most of the white teachers wouldn’t look at us and considered a request for help to be loathsome. The black teachers seemed much like the black students. They walked softly, their eyes shifting from side to side, their backs raised in preparation for battle like a few cats strolling through a den of German shepherds.
I wondered about Eliza Blizzard, thinking that this day must be toughest on her. She had helped set it up, and many blacks and whites hated her. They were probably happy to see that she had been demoted during the merger of schools. She went from being principal to a regular teacher at the high school. But soon we would realize that she had taken this in stride and already moved on to greater goals.
It took me almost a full half hour to find out which homeroom I was assigned to, and another five or ten minutes to find it. On the way there, I tried to notice everything about the condition of the building. This new school was a world apart from my old one. As I told Bojack later that night, “Everything was in place and shar-r-rp. Right on down to the metal edges on their rulers. And they had so much more of everything.”
“You just been used to they leftovers,” Bojack replied.
“I guess so.”
“Did it scare you? I mean, everythang being so nice and in good shape?”
“It made me more mad than scared.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Yeah, I was mad that I didn’t have all that stuff before. And I was scared, too. Sometimes, it was sorta like being in a doctor’s office. Everything was shiny and cold, you know?”
“Oh, I know. But I reckon that was more the peoples than the place.”
The Emancipation of Evan Walls Page 12