Like One of the Family

by Alice Childress

  “Well, it’ll all get clearer as we go along,” I said…. “Now when you got to plunge your hands in all them dirty clothes in order to put them in the machine … how come you can’t see that it’s a whole lot safer and makes more sense to put your hand in mine and be friends?” Well, Marge, she took my hand and said, “I want to be friends!”

  I was so glad I hadn’t popped her, Marge. The good Lord only knows how hard it is to do things the right way and make peace…. All right now, let’s have the coffee, Marge.

  I COULD RUN A SCHOOL TOO

  I TELL YOU, this is a wonderful age to live in! No, dear, I’m not talkin’ about washin’ machines and such although I must say I’m glad somebody sat down and thought that up, too. What I am talkin’ about is everybody up and at bein’ something like Myrtle’s daughter…. Well, Marge, she is goin’ to actin’ school…. That’s right, she’s gonna be a actress. Ain’t that nice?

  I was over to Myrtle’s house this afternoon, and it was somethin’ to see Doris goin’ on before the mirror and readin’ out loud and studyin’ and practicin’ her lessons! She’s got books on top of books, and she can give you some right smart answers to anything you might ask her about plays and theatres and such…. Yes indeed, I’m that proud of her, and I’m glad to see her really gettin’ down to her lessons, especially since it’s costin’ Myrtle a pretty penny…. Of course, she’s hopin’ to make some money at it and why not? Well, I had Doris about to die laughin’…. Marge, I told her that I believed I could run a actin’ school myself because I know just how everything is supposed to go…. What makes me think so? Well, I’ve seen so many movin’ picture shows until by now I could say that I’ve really got the hang and swing of how things are supposed to happen. That’s a natural fact!

  No, you cannot go by how things happen in life because they never hardly happen in that way at all. Take for example the young lady who plays the lead part. Well, she most always has a boyfriend that has got himself in trouble by tryin’ to solve a murder or somethin’…. That’s right, although I must say that I’ve never yet had the pleasure of meetin’ anybody that had the time to do that kind of thing day in and out like they do in the movies. But be that as it may, the young lady in the story always follows her boyfriend around and gets mixed up in the thing too until finally the bad man and her boyfriend get into a big fistfight near the end of the story.

  Now it is most important that when they have this fight that she remembers to retire to a corner of the room and tremble in fear…. No, she is not allowed to holler. She must put her hand over her mouth so as not to let the holler escape and just roll her eyes around lookin’ pitiful and scared. Then the bad man will drop his gun, her boyfriend will wallow all over the floor tryin’ to beat the evil man to that gun! … No Marge! She must never pick it up and give it to him or kick it out of the way. She must run to the other side of the room thus givin’ them more room to roll and tumble!

  You must be out of your mind, Marge! … Of course she can’t hit the other man with a bat or do anything like that! … Well, it might be life but that ain’t got a thing to do with actin’! Well, things keep goin’ along like that, with her goin’ from one end of the room to the other until her boyfriend finally gives the villain one big whoppin’ right to the jaw which right will knock him out cold. After he knocks him out, he will stand there lookin’ kind of groggy and beat while a little stream of blood trickles down the corner of Ms mouth…. Marge, it must come down the corner of his mouth because if it was comin’ from his eye, you would expect him to have a black eye, wouldn’t you? … And who ever heard of a hero with a black eye? … I don’t care how many bare-knuckle licks he took, he must not have no black eyes or puffed up mouth or bashed in nose or nothin’ like that! … Well, of course you can know he was in a fight. He can wear a little plaster patch on one cheek, he can perspire and also have his hair ruffled up. And that’s how you would know!

  Well now, after he knocks out the murderer, she faints. … That’s right, all actresses must hit the floor at this very moment, but she mustn’t fall down bam the way Martha did when she heard about her father passin’ away. She is just supposed to whirl aroun’ kinda half like and fall quietly, then her boyfriend must pick her up and put her down on the couch…. Now, that’s a foolish question! There’s got to be a couch! … No, they do not faint in rooms that don’t have couches! Next thing, he pours her a glass of water from the water jug that is always full and ready and waitin’ on the desk. He holds the glass to her lips, and she comes out of it gently sippin’ the water and never chokes on it the way Martha did. After this, the actress begins to cry and maybe holler a little while he comforts her and keeps sayin’ her name over and over. Then he kisses her and she runs her hands through his hair and tells him, “Hold me, hold me.” … Marge, I know that is what he’s doin’, but she has to tell him anyway!

  … Now you see there! That’s where you’re wrong! Of course you would help him beat up the murderer and of course you would yell your lungs out while scratchin’ out his eyes, but that’s not the way it’s supposed to be done!

  Oh yes, I’m an expert! The hero must always win the fight, he must not get mussed up lookin’ except in a pretty kinda way, the bad man is always caught, the couple always lives happily ever after, nobody ever has to worry about goin’ to work, everybody’s got a nice place to live and nobody but nobody ever has to worry about how they are goin’ to pay the rent or gas and light bill. And that’s why I could run a actin’ school and you couldn’t. I know all the answers, and they’re just the opposite of what you or anybody else would naturally think!

  I VISIT YESTERDAY

  MARGE, YOUR TABLE sure is fixed up pretty—flowers and everything! Stanley sure will be most impressed! I don’t know what you’d do if you had money ’cause as it is you really know how to put-on-the-dog! … Oh, yes, me and Eddie will be here, have no fear about that! I’m goin’ upstairs to get dressed right now. I would’ve been ready exceptin’ that I had a little stop to make on my way home from work.

  You know, sometimes a duty visit can be one of the nicest kind of things. Well, there’s certain folks that I visit once or twice a year ’cause I oughta. Miss Jeanie is one of ’em. She was a dear friend of my Grandma. Miss Jeanie is in her nineties now and most of her old friends have passed on. So it gets kinda lonely-like for her. I put off visitin’ her for a terrible long time, and then one day I just pick up and go before I get a chance to change my mind. I take her a little token and sit and chat with her for a while. I should go more often ’cause she makes fine company.

  She lives with one of her grandchildren, and it is all they can do to make her sit quiet and take some ease…. Oh, her mind is still sharp, she can hear well and her health is not too bad but of course her strength gets taxed awful easy…. Yes, she loves visitors.

  Miss Jeanie’s mama was a slave, and she told her a lot of stories about slave-times and Miss Jeanie can go back quite a way herself and tell you things that’s just pure amazin’! When I visit her I feel like I’m ’bout ten years old ’cause she will look at me and say, “Well, I declare, if it ain’t little Mildred, it’s really somethin’ how time passes! These little babies are all grown up!” She says that every time we meet, and it’s not long before she gets ’round to all them stories. I kinda lead her into them sort of…. Well, I will say, “I guess you’ve seen a lot of things, Miss Jeanie, and I’ll bet today looks a lot different from times gone by.”

  Then she says, “I’m so glad for these young people comin’ along now. I love ’em, and it’s good to see that they goin’ on and on. If my mama was to come back here now and take a look ’round, that poor soul couldn’t believe her eyes! I thank God, yes, thank God, I lived these years to see it. Mildred, the good God has been good to me! Ain’t many people been gifted to sight the wonders and changes that these old eyes seen!”

  Today I asked her, “Can you remember any of the stories ’bout the ‘old days,’ Miss Jeanie?” And she says
, “My recollection is long and ain’t none of them stories left my mind. Don’t you give no listenin’ to any folks talkin’ ’bout ‘good ole days’ ’cause wasn’t no such thing, wasn’t nothin’ but a long tired yesterday!”

  Marge, she settled back in the big arm chair and smoothed her dress apron…. Yes, she always wears a pretty apron even though the relatives try to keep her from doin’ things in the house. Her greatgranddaughter Thelma told me, “Great-grand just insists on unpackin’ the groceries when they come. She feels all the packages and looks at the labels and then lines them up nice and neat on the shelves, loves to put away groceries.”

  Miss Jeanie nodded her head, “’Course I like to do that! If you children seen as much old weevily meat and meal as me, you’d like to put away groceries too. I reckon my mama never seen a boxfull of groceries in all her days, never had no boxfull of nothin’ but trouble! Back in them bad days folks seen nothin’ but heap of work and most misery. Thing that’s most hurtful to me is how my mama didn’t get to look at some good days ’fore she closed her eyes.

  “If I could tell you in the same words like she spoke, you’d know what I mean, but all I can do is give you a little-bitty notion ’bout them trials and things. Poor soul didn’t know what a bed look like, never had nothin’ but straw on the floor for her to sleep. Mama told me how in the evenin’ the slave-folk was all bone-weary, but they’d gather together in a clearin’ and build them a big old campfire. They’d sit ’round in a circle and pray and sing. After a little bit one of the overseers come walkin’ over and touch some little gal on the shoulder and say, ‘Master want to see you.’

  “Poor little child would start to cryin’ but get up and go on off with overseer so’s the master could use her for his pleasure. Why you think all us colored folks is mixed up? When these children tell me ’bout what’s goin’ on in the papers ’bout not wantin’ races mixin’ in the schools, I just suck my teeth and say, ‘Hmmmph! Don’t want to mix by day but do want to mix in the dark of the night!’

  “… No, they couldn’t do nothin’ to stop them kind of goin’s on ’cause wouldn’t nothin’ happen ’cept poor slaves get beat or killed! My mama told me that there was big talk ’round the campfire ’bout a black man by the name of Nat Turner. Somebody told her one time that he was gonna set everybody free. Lord have mercy, she used to pray for old Nat to hurry up and come on…. No, it was years later ’fore she found out that Nat had been dead long time ’fore they even heard ’bout him. He wasn’t no Carolina man nohow, he was a Virginia man.”

  Marge, she went on like that, tellin’ us one story after another. The one I liked best was how her mother married again. Miss Jeanie said, “Soon’s my mama was free, she left her slave husband and got married legal to some other man. No, I never could fault her for that, ’cause who wants to have some slavemaster pickin’ out somebody for you to live with, everybody know it wasn’t right. Folks ought to pick and choose they own husband or wife. How’s somebody gonna tell you somethin’ like that? The Lord don’t hold with that kinda doin’ and he’s gonna set his hand ‘gainst folks who go ’round stampin’ on others!”

  Thelma fixed tea for us and we talked some more, then Miss Jeanie took me in the kitchen to see how she fixed up the pantry shelves real pretty with paper edgin’ all around. “Little Mildred,” she says, “see how all this foodstuff is put up so nice. Got to have all kind of food to make good dinners, got to have all kind of people to make a good world. You young folk got a great day comin’. I hear all ’bout white and black folk sittin’ down and breakin’ bread together. Thelma here, she knows some of ’em. This old world is gettin’ more good folk in it every day. Lord, one of these mornin’s you children gonna wake up and find no more hate and no more meanness. When that happens, you remember that Miss Jeanie told you that.”

  When I was leavin’ she took my hand and said, “You just keep goin’ on up and lookin’ to do better ’cause everything’s gonna be all right. I want you children to have a lot of enjoyment so’s it’ll make up for what my mama missed, and when I get to Glory, I’m gonna sit down with little Mildred’s grandma and I’m gonna tell her, ‘Eliza, them children are doin’ just fine so don’t you worry none but let’s you and me sit back in the easy-chair and take a little rest.’”

  Marge, it did me a lot of good to go and see that old lady, and I think I’m gonna enjoy this dinner tonight a whole lot better than if I hadn’t gone.

  STORY TELLIN’ TIME

  MARGE, THE FOLKS I work for can get some worried about me. Like for example when I went in to the job this mornin’ and put my newspaper on the hall table. In no time flat Mrs. B. picked up my paper and began to go through it. “Oh,” says she, “it’s so seldom that I see a colored paper, do you mind if I read it, Mildred?” “No,” I says, “just you go on and help yourself.” I went on and changed my clothes and after a while she got up and came in the bedroom where I was makin’ up her bed. “Mildred,” she says, “I see here where Paul Robeson is giving a concert somewhere. You wouldn’t go to anything like that, would you?”

  What did I say? … Almost nothin’. I just finished smoothin’ the spread and started for the kitchen to do the dishes. Oh, yes, I did say, “Have you ever seen such a lovely bright sunshiny day?” In a little while she drifts into the kitchen and starts nibblin’ on the subject again. “I know you wouldn’t go to a concert like that.” … No, Marge, I didn’t bite on the bait. All I said was, “Where did you get these gorgeous orange juice glasses?” Honey, she wasn’t thinkin’ of lettin’ up, and she keeps pursuin’ the subject. “Mildred, Paul Robeson is the kind of man who gets his people in trouble. You don’t want to get in trouble, do you?” Then I said, “No, indeed, I do not want to get in trouble,” Now that would have been enough for anybody but you know who. “Mildred,” she says, “the only reason I ask you these things is because I feel a concern for you and I’d also like you to know all about the kind of people that will make trouble. I’m sure that you’ve heard a lot about …” I cut her off then, “Mrs. B.,” I says, “do you mind if I tell you a story?” Her face lit up like a flashlight. “I’d be simply delighted!” Then I dried my hands and told her this story.

  Once upon a time there was an old slavemaster and he owned a slave named Jim, and hardly a day went by that old Master didn’t say, “Jim, you got to have a whippin’,” and he’d have Jim tied down and then he’d lay on the lashes hard and fast. Old Master never gave Jim enough to eat, just weevily meal and rancid salt meat and garbage scraps. And although Jim worked fourteen and fifteen hours a day, he didn’t own a pair of shoes and the only thing he had to wear was cast off rags; in fact the only thing he got regular and on time was whippin’s … and I say that to say this: Master was mean!

  Fast as Jim and his wife had children, old Master sold them so’s he could send his only son, little Master, to a big fancy college to get cultured and refined. And he sold Jim’s wife so that he could give his only daughter, little Mistress, harp lessons and piano lessons and embroidery lessons so’s she could grow up and be a cultured, genteel and refined Miss Lady.

  When the Civil War broke out and was fought and won, It worried old Master to death that he had to turn his slaves out in a cold, unfriendly world, and he stood on the big veranda that Jim had built and wept as he waved goodbye: “Who’s gonna take care of you now?”

  After old Master got over his cryin’ spell, he formed the

  Ku Klux and went out shootin’ down some of Jim’s relatives just to let Jim know that old Master wasn’t dead yet, or even dyin’ for that matter. And then he put Jim to work on his land on a share plan…. Jim sharin’ all the work and Master’s share bein’ all the profit.

  And Master used some of his profits to build special things for Jim’s relatives like special schools, railroad waitin’ rooms and county jails. He also spent some of his profits to pass laws makin’ it illegal for Jim to eat in certain restaurants or go in theatres or even to marry whom he pleased or walk the streets
after eleven o’clock at night. Master also told the hospitals not to admit Jim or his relatives and many of them died right at the hospital door.

  In fact, old Master went so far as to pass laws against Jim’s people socializin’ with white folks who didn’t agree with Master’s plans. Old Master warned Jim that white folks who would live in the same buildin’ with colored folks and laugh and talk with colored … well, folks like that were rabble-rousin’, common, low-flung trash that were out to create trouble between Jim and old Master.

  And old Master lynched thousands of Jim’s kinfolks, and of course as time went by it was worth Jim’s life to try and get to the polls to vote. And such misery old Master brought about … ’til World War I.

  And then old Master calls Jim and says, “Jim, boy, we all got our faults, you got yours and I got mine. Let’s shake hands and go off and fight for Democracy so’s we can live in peace.” And Jim tried him one time and went, but when he got back old Master started the same old burnin’ and killin’.

  Time went by and one day old Master called Jim and he says, “Jim, you got your faults and I got mine, but let’s shake hands and go off and fight one more war for Democracy, and this time I swear on the foundations of my plantation that this is it!”

  I don’t know whether Jim believed him or not, but he went on and said, “All right, we’ll try it one more time.”

  Soon as Jim got back old Master was awful annoyed because Jim was walkin’ around with a uniform full of medals and raisin’ merry Ned about votin’. And old Master had veterans’ eyes gouged out and the killin’s started all over again.