by Dave Isay
My first week my paycheck was $240, and that first year I made $13,000 in the shop—at that point I had been getting $8,000 a year on welfare. The next year I made $19,000, the year after that I think I made $26,000, and it’s gone up from there. So it changed everything. It was a lot of money—hard-earned money. I didn’t think I was going to make it—I was the only woman in a cabinet shop with twenty-nine guys—but I did it. I was running the shaper, the planer, table saws—everything.
Kasima: And you’d never used any of those before? Johnella: Never—but I learned. One time I brought a cabinet home, and I set it on the kitchen table. Your brother walked in, and he goes, “Where’d you buy that?” I said, “Your mother made it!”
Kasima: I remember you just being busy, busy all the time. You were always dirty. [laughs] Dirt in your nails all the time. I didn’t really understand what was going on, but I’m really thankful that you did that for us.
Johnella: Do you remember—I didn’t have a car, so I had to ride my bicycle to drop you off at the babysitter’s at five thirty in the morning. Then I rode three miles to work every single day for two years. I was in really good shape! And one day it was raining, and you said, “No more bicycle! No more bicycle!” I mean, you were just sobbing. I thought, Okay. Maybe we should try and get a car. . . . [laughs]
There were problems, no doubt. This one guy would say to me, “Why are you here? You should go home.” He didn’t think women belonged in the shop. I was like, You got to be kidding me, right? I said, “I don’t have a husband to take care of me. I’m feeding everybody in this house. There’s nobody paying my bills.”
I had to survive: I had kids to take care of. And I had nothing else—I just squeaked through high school, had kids when I was really young—so I had to hang in there. And I did. If you can get to the job, you can do the job. Sometimes the rest of your life can stop you, and that’s where you have to just say: No matter what happens from three thirty in the afternoon to seven o’clock the next morning, I just have to deal with that so I can get back into that shop. And that’s what I did. I was proud of that—I am proud of that.
I go to places now and I see reception counters that I helped build, and I’m just proud that I did it, you know? Now I’m going to college for the first time—today was actually my first day—and I know now that I can probably learn anything. But I didn’t know that before.
Kasima: I just had a baby; he’s four and a half months old. You make me motivated to support myself and my son. I’m not exactly sure what I want to do yet or how I’m going to do it, but I’m going to do something. I’m just wondering how I can be a good mother to him by myself.
Johnella: I think that the creator puts something in front of you, and you just have to grab it and see what you can do with it.
Kasima: I hope I can be as strong as you are.
Johnella:You are as strong as I am.
Kasima: Do you have any words of wisdom for me?
Johnella: As a parent you can make a lot of mistakes, but you can always fix them. If you say something that you didn’t mean, just say: “I didn’t mean that; I was upset.” Just fix it right away, because people carry things inside and you don’t want that. You’ll make mistakes—you’re a human being. So just forgive yourself and move on.
I know there’ve been days when I raced home and tried to get dinner on the table, and somebody’s lost their bus pass, someone’s done this, someone’s done that—none of that matters. What really matters is that you keep your cool with your children. The house being clean—forget it, it doesn’t matter. Having dinner on the table—it doesn’t matter. If you’re stuck and it’s raining out and you’re in the car, have a picnic in the car. I know this for a fact: it’ll mean more to your child than rushing home, screaming at them, and trying to get dinner on. The baby can be in his car seat and you can sit in the backseat with him, and you’ll just have a beautiful time that he’ll remember forever.
Kasima: Thanks a lot for being my mother.
Johnella: You’re welcome. I just wanted to make life better for you kids. I know that there’s only so far I can go. Now it’s up to you to take it and run.
Recorded in Oakland, California, on August 18, 2009.
DIANE GAYLES, 58 talks with her daughter, JENNIFER GAYLES, 30
Diane Gayles: When I was in Buffalo in kindergarten through third grade, I was a very good student. Unfortunately, when we moved to Lancaster, a suburb of Buffalo, the course work was much more rigorous, and so I didn’t do as well initially. There was quite a lot of civil-rights activity at the time, and it was very difficult being the only black children in a white neighborhood. But it taught me a lot.
I was going into fourth grade—it was my first day of class, and the teacher’s name was Ms. Devaney. She was calling names and having everyone line their desks up according to her chart. As she was calling off the different children’s names, they were helping each other move their desks and put them in the different rows. Then when she called my name, no one came to help me. So I had to struggle to move my desk by myself. The teacher said, “Won’t someone help Diane?” And no one would, so she came and she helped me move my desk. That was my first introduction to racism.
I was all alone and I knew I was all alone, and quite honestly, my father had told us that that was probably what would happen. But there was brightness there as well. This is back when you had recess and you actually went out on the playground and played. Everyone was out there playing, and I just knew no one was going to talk to me. I was standing there watching the boys—they were playing, roughhousing and kicking a ball, and the girls were on the swings and they were chatting away. So I just stood next to the building by myself. And then this one girl in our class came up. Every time I think about it, it makes me cry . . . Melissa Tousley. I’ll never forget her. She came up to me, and she said, “Would you like to play with me?” [crying]
I never felt so alone. But she came and offered friendship to me when no one else did or would. She’ll never know how much that meant to me. Unfortunately, when we got to junior high her family moved away, and I don’t know where she went. I’ve always thought about her. She has no idea what she did for me. . . .
Jennifer Gayles: ...I never knew that story.
Diane: Your father chose your name, but I wanted to name you Melissa because of Melissa Tousley.
Jennifer: What was going through your mind when you first saw me?
Diane: I couldn’t believe it. First of all, I couldn’t believe that I had a daughter. Because I had all brothers, I felt that I would always have boys. First, your brother came along, and then when you came along, I said, “It’s going to be another boy.” So when you were born, I just started thinking about all the things that we were going to do and how I was going to dress you up. I had lots of plans for you—still do.
You were just wonderful; you were a piece of cake. Taking care of you was easy because you just took care of yourself! I remember one instance when I had to take your brother to the bus stop. George was five years old, and you were two. We lived about five houses from the corner, and I had to stand on the corner with George, waiting for the bus. So I said, “Jennifer, stay here in the crib—don’t get out,” and I left you in the house and took George down to the bus stop. We had been doing this for quite some time, no problem whatsoever. Well this one particular day I’m standing at the bus stop and I’m looking at the house, and I see the curtains move, and I go, “Why are the curtains moving?” I could just see them moving, and I said, “Oh my gosh!” I knew you had gotten out of the crib, and I didn’t know what you were going to do. So I grabbed George and I ran back to the house—the bus was going to come any moment. I got in the house, and I said, “Jennifer, why are you out of your crib?” And you said, “Mommy, the phone was ringing.”
Jennifer: I didn’t want you to miss a call!
Diane: I guess not—you were a telephone operator at a young age. So I put you back in the crib and told you not to wo
rry about the phone. I actually took the phone off the hook and then took George back out, and we caught the bus.
But you were a very easy child. You were just a little clingy. You weren’t my daughter—you were my shadow. When you were four, I said to your dad, “She has to go to nursery school. I can’t take it! Anywhere I go, she’s right behind me!” So we scrimped and saved and lived on beans and rice, and we got the money together to send you to nursery school. That was the best thing that ever happened for you and for me. I wound up with peace of mind, and you made friends. When you came back you started telling me about your adventures at nursery school, and then you went off and played by yourself—
Jennifer: I wasn’t your shadow anymore. That was the beginning of my independence.
Diane: Hallelujah!
Jennifer: Do you remember when I left home for good?
Diane:You were funny because you came home from college and you said, “I’m only going to stay here about three, maybe four months, and then I’m gone.” I really didn’t think that would happen, but it did. At first the house was so empty. That first week—I’ll never forget it—it was so, so empty. I came home and I just walked from one bedroom to the other, and I was just feeling so depressed. That lasted about a week. Then I realized how free we were. Oh, Martin Luther King, Free at last, free at last! And that’s when our life really took off. I can remember you and George calling and leaving messages: “Where are you two now?” We were gone all the time.
I am so proud of you and your brother, of the way that you have turned out. Your dad and I are so proud of you. You may not know that, or maybe you do—but it always helps to say it.
Recorded in Buffalo, New York, on August 15, 2008.
GABRIELLE HALL, 29 talks with her sister, DANIELLE HALL, 27 about their mother, Martha Hall.
Gabrielle Hall: Mom was amazing. I think she was the coolest person, because she did so many things and was really good at all of them. I picture Mom on the beach in Maine. I picture her with the auburn hair that’s short, not the gray hair.
Danielle Hall: I see her lying in the bed that Dad made, with the sunshine coming in, looking over the water. That was really my favorite time to go in—we would lie down on the bed and just kind of fuss or talk. That was always our time with her.
She taught me things about relationships that I still use. She told me that when you fight, you have to decide how much it really matters to you. If it’s not worth getting upset about, let it go. And if it is worth getting upset about, you have to be brave enough to bring it up with the other person. And if you aren’t brave enough to do that, you have to let it go. Once you’ve discussed it, it’s over and you never bring it up again. That, I think, is just the best advice I’ve ever gotten.
I keep remembering the night of the eclipse—it really crystallized for me what I loved about Mom. It was the night before I went on my first date with Brian, and I was really high-strung and worried. I was at home getting ready, and she was trying to calm me down. There was going to be a lunar eclipse, so we turned off the lights, and we put our feet up on the windowsill. We were trying to look at the eclipse, but neither of us had our glasses, so we couldn’t really see anything. The lights were off, and we were just totally giddy. Mom got out a roll of Neccos and handed them to me, and I was sniffing each one in the dark, trying to sniff the colors that she liked to eat.
It wasn’t the big conversations with Mom that mattered; it was just being able to spend time together and be ourselves.
Gabrielle: She was such a fighter—we knew for fourteen years that she had cancer and that she was dying, but she believed at the essence of her that she was not going to die.
Danielle: I feel blessed that we had fourteen years. Before she died, I told her that I thought that she had been a wonderful mother, that she taught us how to be strong and independent and smart and capable of doing anything, that I loved her, and that we would be okay. But she really wanted to know that you would be okay.
Gabrielle: I always imagined that I would just die after Mom died. I couldn’t even fathom how my life would go on without her. I think the most shocking thing was just waking up and realizing I was still breathing and deciding to go on.
In the end she went so quickly. We just got into this state of her being chronically sick. I remember taking her to chemotherapy and talking to her in the chemo room, and she was just so sick, she was so sick. I would be like, “Mom, you don’t have to keep doing it.” And then it came true. She was back in the hospital again, they had done some tests, and they said, “It’s fourteen days.” And then she died—fourteen days later.
Danielle: I remember our last Thanksgiving, with Mom in her pajamas.
Gabrielle: The day she finally came out of the hospital was Thanksgiving. We had always had the same Thanksgiving, but this year’s Thanksgiving was different. Then it started being a really significant day, that we really had stuff to be thankful about—that we had Mom. It was the last meal she had. Mom died on December 5th.
At her service we asked everybody to wear red shoes, but we didn’t really explain why. Mom would wear red shoes to chemotherapy, and she’d tell everybody there that you couldn’t have a bad day if you were wearing red shoes. So I got up and I said that everybody was wearing red shoes because Mom believed that you couldn’t have a bad day when you were wearing red shoes. I had on a pair of red high heels, and I’m wearing red clogs today.
Danielle: I like the idea of going out on December 5 and putting on red shoes and just celebrating.
Gabrielle: We’re going to use days like Thanksgiving and days where we wear red shoes to remember her. She lived life so fully, and we can’t ever forget to do that.
Recorded in San Francisco, California, on November 23, 2005.
DANIELLE HALL (left) AND GABRIELLE HALL (right)
FANNI VICTORIA GREEN-LEMONS, 49 speaks with her daughter, DANYEALAH GREEN-LEMONS, 15 about her mother, Pauline Green.
Fanni Victoria Green-Lemons: When I was your age, my mother and I had to negotiate about letting go. She and my dad had raised us to be fiercely independent, magnanimously hopeful, and well grounded—with common sense and a wonderful sense of the presence of the Lord in our lives. But actually providing opportunities for us to go out into the world and be those things was scary for her, I think, and so we had bouts and battles and skirmishes. For such a long period of time, my mother and I seemed to communicate across a great divide of misunderstanding, and I want so much not to have that with you.
Danyealah Green-Lemons: We always talk about your relationship with Nana, and I think my relationship with you is a lot different. We talk about things, and I come to you when I need help or when I need to talk. I keep learning from you every single day—simple things, like how to be a strong and independent woman, how to live life, and how to treat people—that’s a big one because you treat people wonderfully and you give so much.You keep in touch with people. I’m definitely learning from you how to maintain relationships.
When I see you with Nana, I’m always observing how you communicate with her: your body language and what you say and how you say it to her. When she talks, I see that you are listening but that you are also analyzing what she’s saying, so that when you say something, it will make sense to her even though she might not agree with you.
Fanni: When she got older, my mom was so very feisty about her level of care. She would not let us—her daughters—help her, and I was angry. I thought she raised us to do exactly that, and she wouldn’t let us do it. I was afraid that we weren’t going to be able to be of help to her until she got to the place where it was clear that she wasn’t going to be able to help he rself.
I will never forget asking my mom to see assisted-living facilities. She would say she would go one day, and then she wouldn’t go the next. We just didn’t know what was going to happen. And so I called the mother of my best friend, and I said, “What do I do?” And she said, “Fanni, mothers can never resist their children when
their children simply bare their hearts. So don’t go in and try to be strong for your mom. Don’t go in and try to make her do anything. Just look your mom in the eye and tell her you need her help in order for you to help her.” So I did. And my mom looked back at me and said, “I will go. Although I’m so scared, I will go.” And I put my head in her lap, and I cried. But she didn’t. She put her hand under her chin like she does, and she just looked off to the side. Then when I got done crying, she said, “Well, we’d better go do this before I change my mind.”
What I want to say to you is that sometimes life catches you by surprise and you feel unequipped to handle what it brings you, but every bit of life you’ve lived before that moment equips you to live through it. That’s what I would give to you.
Recorded in Tampa, Florida, on December 11, 2008.
DEVOTION
PAM PISNER, 54, AND DAN PISNER, 55 talk to their daughter, SHIRA PISNER, 25
Pam Pisner: Dad and I had known each other for five years before we got married, and then it was actually eight years before you were born. We talked about having children because we thought it would be really cool to see the product of the two of us. We were such a good team together, and we just wanted to know what it would be like to make some babies.
Shira Pisner: How did the product come out?
Pam: Beautiful. We love the product. It was a little bit more of a product than we originally planned on. [laughs] But it was good.
Dan Pisner: We thought that we most likely wouldn’t have children—
Pam:Well, we were afraid, because I had such a difficult time conceiving—and that was pretty devastating. I think we started trying seriously maybe two or three years after we got married. And then it was a few years before we decided to take Pergonal, which is the fertility drug that I took to get pregnant. It was something that we had said we would never do.
