Peace From Broken Pieces: How to Get Through What You're Going Through

by Vanzant, Iyanla

  Grandma taught me how to suck up to people who had something I needed or wanted, and she taught me that I was powerless to influence how it would be doled out. When I wanted something from Grandma, I would sit quietly in her line of sight, without a toy, without saying a word. If I sat there long enough, she would ask what was wrong with me. Her tone of voice would let me know if I should ask for a sandwich or a cookie or if I could watch something on television—or if it was safer to lie and say that nothing was wrong. When I did ask, her granting permission was usually preceded by complaints about me. I learned to tolerate the put-downs in order to get what I wanted. One of the more important lessons Grandma taught me was that if someone told you she loved you, or if you thought she was supposed to love you, it was okay for her to treat you badly. In fact, you should expect the people you loved and needed to treat you badly. It was a sign of how much they loved you.

  Despite all that she did not do for me and did not give to me, Grandma did teach me how to cook. Or perhaps I should say I learned to do the dirty work so that she could cook. Oh my God, could the woman cook! In fact, that’s what she did for a living. Being an uneducated mix of Native American and African, she had to do what she was good at, and that was cleaning and cooking.

  She was what they called a “domestic,” cooking for wealthy people who lived in White Plains and Yonkers, New York. There were times when she worked as far away as Connecticut, riding the Harlem-Hudson line as early as 5 A.M. She would cook for her “madam,” then come home and cook for my brother and me.

  Grandma taught me that I had to earn my keep to stay in her house. I was too short to reach on top of the stove, but I could stand on a wooden milk crate at the sink. She taught me how to clean the gook out of the back of the chicken and pull the slimy stuff from under the skin. She taught me how to dip the feet into a bowl of hot water and peel off the crusty outer layer. I was deathly afraid of chicken feet, but I learned to keep my mouth shut and hold those nasty feet with a napkin. She showed me how to mix the yeast in hot water when making homemade rolls and how to sprinkle salt and pepper evenly on both sides of the pork chops before I patted them down with flour. All of these were things little girls of my generation needed to know; the problem was, she barked her instructions and never complimented me for doing a good job. Learning and cooking with Grandma was not fun, it was work. It taught me that I should always expect to work hard for everything I needed or wanted, and that work was not supposed to be fun. Surprisingly, I love to cook, but I must admit, it is serious business in my house.

  On my father’s side my great-grandfather was a secondgeneration share-cropper married to a Native American. Together they had 16 children; thirteen survived. My grandmother, the ninth of the 13, was married to a mulatto at 14 and widowed at 15. Some in the family say that she was sold to pay a debt. Others say she was won in a bet. She would never talk about it. My grandmother had one child, my father, whom she left behind when he was just five years old so she could travel to New York and work as a cook. He followed her when he was 12 so that he could go to school in the city and work as a houseboy for my grandmother’s employer. On my mother’s side, my grandmother was in the second generation born of Dahomian ancestry in this country, the baby of six children. She died when my mother was six years old, and my mother was raised by her older sisters. At age 15, she left home to work for the railroad as a car cleaner. She was working there when she first met my father. She was 29 years old and he was 22, on his way to serve in the United States Army. Somehow, four years later, after he was dishonorably discharged, they got together. I’m not sure if he forgot to tell her that he was married or if she knew and didn’t care. I now understand that our life experiences come forth from our souls and that nothing really happens to us; it all happens for our benefit. If it is true that we choose the conditions of our birth and the families we are born into, I wonder why I would choose a family grouping that needed so much and had so little to offer. This is a huge piece of the puzzle. Even now, I wonder what my soul was seeking as I lived through the bad behavior, irresponsibility, and rage of the adults in my life who were supposed to be guiding me.

  A little girl needs a nurturing, feminine figure—or a reasonable facsimile thereof—who can usher her into womanhood. I had neither, not that I consciously remember. My mother lost her mother, and my father had the facsimile. What I did have in my life was a collection of women who gave me conflicting messages about who they were as women, and who provided a distorted view of what would be expected of me when I became one. There were a host of other strange and distorted messages I received from both the women and the men in my family, each one an ill-fitting piece of the puzzle. When I was in the room with these people all at once—trying to figure out who had the power and what I needed to do to be safe in their presence—the pressure of it all did severe damage to my sense of self in the world.

  The relationship with my grandmother, a woman I loved and feared at the same time, taught me that women must be hard, loud, and mean in order to survive. My childhood relationship with my father led me to believe that men could come and go in your life without rhyme or reason, and that when they showed up, you needed to be on your best behavior to hold their attention. After my mother’s death, my father abandoned me. He was “around,” but he was not really present with me or for me, his only daughter. I never figured out if he didn’t want to be or if he just didn’t know how. I needed emotional support from my father. I needed to know that I was loved, protected, and valued by him in my mother’s absence. More important, I needed to know the truth; his truth, mine, and my mother’s. My father was either unwilling or unable to stand in the truth, much less tell it to me.

  I think my grandmother was a huge piece of that puzzle. Just like me, my father knew that if he said the wrong thing, in the wrong way, at the wrong time, Grandma would have a screaming hissy fit. If he spoke too soon or too loud, she would go after him with her mouth as though he were a cheap cut of tough meat. When she did, he would sit in a kitchen chair with his legs crossed while she paced back and forth in front of him. The foot of whichever leg was crossed would be shaking back and forth at the same pace as Grandma’s speaking. When she pressed him for a response, he would grab his head saying, “Please, Ma, please.” Or, “I don’t know, Ma, please.” The only time I ever heard my daddy raise his voice with Grandma was the day my brother and I moved out. Not only did he raise his voice, he pushed her away from the door so that we could get out.

  I know I was five years old because I was excited about going to school like my brother Ray. I also know that it was summertime because Ray and I were home alone; Grandma was at work when Mr. Fletcher came to the door. Mr. Fletcher was the insurance man. He came around every two weeks or so to collect money from Grandma. He was very tall, and he always gave me and Ray a lollipop. On most of his visits, he would meet Grandma on the front steps of our building. On this particular day, when Ray and I were home alone, Mr. Fletcher walked right up to our apartment door and knocked.

  Grandma always left us with strict instructions not to open the door for anyone. But this was Mr. Fletcher. I knew because he knocked and announced himself. When I heard his name, I must have had visions of sucking on a red, orange, or even a green lollipop. Ray didn’t move. So, without guidance from my older brother, I went to the door. I said that Grandma wasn’t home. Sweet old Mr. Fletcher told me he had some papers for her. In an effort to be helpful, I dragged a kitchen chair over to the door, turned the lock, got down, and welcomed Mr. Lollipop like I had good home training.

  Mr. Fletcher didn’t come in. He handed me the papers, instructed me to give them to Grandma, and then said, “Now lock the door. I’ll stand here to make sure.”

  I wanted to ask him for a lollipop, but since he didn’t offer me one, I knew better than to ask. When he heard the lock click, he said again to make sure I gave the papers to Grandma, and then he was gone.

  When Grandma came home, I was so proud of myself
, she was hardly in the door before I jumped up and shoved the papers into her hands. It took her a moment to catch on.

  “Did your daddy come here today?” ay was mum. I told her no.

  “How did you get the papers from Mr. Fletcher?”

  I remember that was the exact moment that Ray left the kitchen.

  “I opened the door but I didn’t let him in.” I explained everything just as it happened, but it didn’t help. As soon as I spoke the last word, a hand went up and came down right across my face. Everything that followed was an out-of-body experience. I remember that I went to bed that night without dinner. I know because Ray managed to hide a piece of his dinner roll under his shirt. He gave it to me when he was sure that Grandma would not discover him leaning over my bed.

  Maybe a week or so later, a pretty lady came to pick me up. Her name was Nett, which was short for Lynnette. I had met her on several occasions when Daddy took me and Ray for a ride in his car. She was one of the many ladies he took riding with us. She was always nice to me, and she smelled really good. Nett was my father’s wife, my stepmother, and my relationship with her became my saving grace. Nett accepted, nurtured, and encouraged me. What she could not and did not do was stand up for me. We loved each other deeply, but she taught me to love in secret in order to keep the power of our love alive.

  On this day, Nett had come to take me school shopping. When we talked about the experience many years later, she told me that she wanted to give me a bath because I had a slight odor. To her surprise, when she removed my undershirt, she also removed most of the skin from my back. She was horrified, and I was petrified because it meant that I would have to tell what happened. I told her about the Mr. Fletcher incident and how Grandma beat me with the ironing cord until my back was raw. I begged her not to tell my daddy because Grandma said if I did, she would throw me out of the kitchen window, down into the alley with the dogs. I did not want to be eaten by the dogs.

  But Nett did tell my daddy what had happened. Within hours, I, my brother, and all of our clothing and toys were packed. We were about to leave when Grandma came home from work. There was yelling and screaming. I saw something I had never in my life seen before: Grandma crying. As Daddy pushed her away from the door so that we could get out, she fell to her knees crying and begging: “Please, please, take her but don’t take Ray! Leave him with me, please!”

  Daddy yelling! Grandma crying! These were new and totally confusing experiences. So was moving into a one-bedroom apartment where my daddy came home every night and where Ray and I slept on a pull-out couch. I had never seen one of those before.

  Once he moved us into the one-bedroom apartment, Daddy gave us all strict orders that we were not to let Grandma in—ever! On most days, I could look out of the living room window and see her standing outside, watching the house. Sometimes she would wait by the school playground for me and Ray to get out of school. She never spoke to us, and we acted like we didn’t see her. Ray would grab my hand, and we would skip by her as if she were a light post. Grandma would follow us, walking a half block behind us until we got home. Nett worked, so Ray had a key and would let us into the house. We knew to do our homework and watch television until one of the adults came home. I must admit, it felt kind of good to know that somebody was watching us when we were home alone, even if it was Grandma.

  We only lived in the small apartment for a few weeks. After that, we moved into a two-bedroom apartment where Ray and I shared a room. We each had a twin bed, a nightstand, a dresser, and a lamp. We had to share the closet, which I didn’t mind because there was enough room under the clothes for us to hide from each other.

  Ray was my hero whom I absolutely loved and admired. When he wasn’t preoccupied by his asthma—a real and ever-present threat to his life—he was a sweet, gentle spirit who could always make me laugh. He felt things very deeply, but because he was a boy who was supposed to be tough, he rarely showed his gentle side. Instead, he seemed to steel himself against the world, against everyone and everything in it. He rarely smiled and he never cried; his eyes told the story.

  When he was frightened, his eyes would become glazed and fixed. It would look as if the fluid in his eyeballs was frozen because his eyes were so shiny and still. When he was upset or angry, he would squint as if trying to find his way out of a dark room. He did this a lot when Daddy lectured him about being tough and not acting like a sissy. After one of those lectures, Ray would push me away and tell me to leave him alone, as if I had done something wrong. No matter what I offered or how much I begged him to tell me what was wrong, he would refuse to speak. This would go on for days until something, I’m not sure what, softened his heart again. When his heart was open, Ray was the only place I could find comfort. The thing I remember most about my brother Ray is his compassion. After I got slapped or snatched for doing or saying something out of line at Grandma’s house, I would go sit by Ray. If no one was looking, he would let me rest my head on his shoulder and cry. A few times, he even put his arms around me and kissed my cheek. If, however, we heard Grandma’s footsteps coming, he would disentangle himself from me and act like I wasn’t even there.

  I remember one Halloween—I must have been six or seven years old—we had not seen or heard from my father for several days. To keep us occupied, Nett dressed us in Halloween costumes she created from old clothes. Ray had on a suit that was six times too big for him, one of my father’s old hats and a pair of his shoes. I had on one of my stepmom’s old dresses, accessorized by some old jewelry, high-heeled shoes, and a purse. The thing that excited me the most was the lipstick. My stepmom covered my cheeks and my lips with red lipstick. I looked fabulous. Absolutely so! We were allowed to go trick-or-treating through the four floors of the apartment building we lived in. We each had a brown shopping bag, and by the time we visited every door on every floor of our building, the bags were filled to capacity.

  We were sitting in the middle of the living-room floor, still dressed in our homemade costumes, sifting through our goodies when Daddy came home. He took one look at us and said to my stepmother, “What the f—— is going on? Why does she look like that?”

  She was explaining to him that it was Halloween and she had let us go out for trick-or-treating in the building. He looked me dead in the eyes and said, “Come here!” He didn’t say a word to Ray. I walked over to him proud as punch in my dressed-up-like-alady costume. I may have even been smiling until he grabbed my cheeks with his hands.

  “Why do you have all of that crap on your face?”

  I wasn’t sure what crap he meant. Surely he wasn’t referring to my lipstick! Before I could say a word, which probably would have been the wrong word, he released my face with a quick snap of his wrist, jerking my head to the side. “Wash that shit off your face.”

  I looked at my stepmom for support. Scurrying, she took me by the hand and we rushed off to the bathroom where I was stripped back down to my normal self. Daddy told Ray to get that mess out of the middle of the floor and go to bed. By the time Ray came into our room, I had my pajamas on. Before turning off the lights, my stepmom whispered, “Don’t worry, I’ll save the candy for you. I’m really sorry.”

  I could hear them talking on the other side of the closed door. It would all have blown over silently, like everything else in our house, if I had just stayed in the bed like Ray and gone to sleep. But I had another brilliant idea.

  On my first trip to the bathroom, I saw the lipstick lying on the side of the sink. I wanted that lipstick! I wanted to look pretty again. I couldn’t figure out what to do with it, so I went back to bed. On my second trip to the bathroom, I found exactly what I needed to activate my plan—a flashlight. It was hanging on a hook behind the bathroom door. I’m not sure how I got it down, but I did. I took it and the lipstick back into the bedroom with me.

  I figured that if I got under the covers, I could use the flashlight to help me put the lipstick on, and I could sleep in my beautiful Halloween face. Brilliant! When I g
ot back in bed, however, I realized I could not see my lips. A mirror! I needed my stepmom’s small hand-held mirror. That necessitated a third trip to the bathroom— one trip too many. Just as I snagged the mirror, one sudden move sent the half-full bottle of Listerine crashing to the hard, cold tile floor.

  “What are you doing?”

  I didn’t answer. I heard the kitchen chair screech across the linoleum floor. I fled the bathroom, jumping across the shattered glass, made it into my room and jumped back in my bed, knowing full well that all hell was about to break loose.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  Even before he saw the broken Listerine bottle, I am sure he smelled it. I don’t think he even stopped in the bathroom. He came straight into our room and turned on the light.

  “What the f——! Look at you! You’ve got lipstick all over the goddamn sheets!”

  He didn’t even mention the Listerine. Instead, he yanked me by my shoulder so that I almost flew out of the bed. He held on to me with one hand while he undid his belt with the other. He was talking, saying something, perhaps reminding me of how disobedient and destructive I was. I couldn’t hear him, though; my heart was pounding too loudly in my ears. When the first blow landed, my heart stopped pounding—I needed all my energy to scream.

  Now, I have been beaten by the best. Grandma was the best beater in the world. In most cases, she prepared you for her beatings by telling you what she was going to do. She would always describe how she was going to take the ironing cord or the extension cord or the switch and beat you until this or that happened. Daddy’s beatings did not come with any descriptive warnings.