My grandmother didn't have an answer that day, but the question lingered in her mind, one that she and Gramps
would sometimes discuss once my mother had gone to bed. They decided that Toot would keep calling Mr. Reed
"Mister," although she understood, with a mixture of relief and sadness, the careful distance that the janitor now
maintained whenever they passed each other in the halls. Gramps began to decline invitations from his coworkers to go
out for a beer, telling them he had to get home to keep the wife happy. They grew inward, skittish, filled with vague
apprehension, as if they were permanent strangers in town.
This bad new air hit my mother the hardest. She was eleven or twelve by this time, an only child just growing out of a
bad case of asthma. The illness, along with the numerous moves, had made her something of a loner-cheerful and easytempered
but p***e to bury her head in a book or wander off on solitary walks-and Toot began to worry that this latest
move had only made her daughter's eccentricities more p***ounced. My mother made few friends at her new school.
She was teased mercilessly for her name, Stanley Ann (one of Gramps's less judicious ideas-he had wanted a son).
Stanley Steamer, they called her. Stan the Man. When Toot got home from work, she would usually find my mother
alone in the front yard, swinging her legs off the porch or lying in the grass, pulled into some solitary world of her own.
Except for one day. There was that one hot, windless day when Toot came home to find a crowd of children gathered
outside the picket fence that surrounded their house. As Toot drew closer, she could make out the sounds of mirthless
laughter, the contortions of rage and disgust on the children's faces. The children were chanting, in a high-pitched,
alternating rhythm:
"n***** lover!"
"Dirty Yankee!"
"n***** lover!"
The children scattered when they saw Toot, but not before one of the boys had sent the stone in his hand sailing over
the fence. Toot's eyes followed the stone's trajectory as it came to rest at the foot of a tree. And there she saw the cause
for all the excitement: my mother and a black girl of about the same age lying side by side on their stomachs in the
grass, their skirts gathered up above their knees, their toes dug into the ground, their heads propped up on their hands in
front of one of my mother's books. From a distance the two girls seemed perfectly serene beneath the leafy shade. It
was only when Toot opened the gate that she realized the black girl was shaking and my mother's eyes shone with
tears. The girls remained motionless, paralyzed in their fear, until Toot finally leaned down and put her hands on both
their heads.
"If you two are going to play," she said, "then for goodness sake, go on inside. Come on. Both of you." She picked up
my mother and reached for the other girl's hand, but before she could say anything more, the girl was in a full sprint,
her long legs like a whippet's as she vanished down the street.
Gramps was beside himself when he heard what had happened. He interrogated my mother, wrote down names. The
next day he took the morning off from work to visit the school principal. He personally called the parents of some of
the offending children to give them a piece of his mind. And from every adult that he spoke to, he received the same
response:
"You best talk to your daughter, Mr. Dunham. White girls don't play with coloreds in this town."
would sometimes discuss once my mother had gone to bed. They decided that Toot would keep calling Mr. Reed
"Mister," although she understood, with a mixture of relief and sadness, the careful distance that the janitor now
maintained whenever they passed each other in the halls. Gramps began to decline invitations from his coworkers to go
out for a beer, telling them he had to get home to keep the wife happy. They grew inward, skittish, filled with vague
apprehension, as if they were permanent strangers in town.
This bad new air hit my mother the hardest. She was eleven or twelve by this time, an only child just growing out of a
bad case of asthma. The illness, along with the numerous moves, had made her something of a loner-cheerful and easytempered
but p***e to bury her head in a book or wander off on solitary walks-and Toot began to worry that this latest
move had only made her daughter's eccentricities more p***ounced. My mother made few friends at her new school.
She was teased mercilessly for her name, Stanley Ann (one of Gramps's less judicious ideas-he had wanted a son).
Stanley Steamer, they called her. Stan the Man. When Toot got home from work, she would usually find my mother
alone in the front yard, swinging her legs off the porch or lying in the grass, pulled into some solitary world of her own.
Except for one day. There was that one hot, windless day when Toot came home to find a crowd of children gathered
outside the picket fence that surrounded their house. As Toot drew closer, she could make out the sounds of mirthless
laughter, the contortions of rage and disgust on the children's faces. The children were chanting, in a high-pitched,
alternating rhythm:
"n***** lover!"
"Dirty Yankee!"
"n***** lover!"
The children scattered when they saw Toot, but not before one of the boys had sent the stone in his hand sailing over
the fence. Toot's eyes followed the stone's trajectory as it came to rest at the foot of a tree. And there she saw the cause
for all the excitement: my mother and a black girl of about the same age lying side by side on their stomachs in the
grass, their skirts gathered up above their knees, their toes dug into the ground, their heads propped up on their hands in
front of one of my mother's books. From a distance the two girls seemed perfectly serene beneath the leafy shade. It
was only when Toot opened the gate that she realized the black girl was shaking and my mother's eyes shone with
tears. The girls remained motionless, paralyzed in their fear, until Toot finally leaned down and put her hands on both
their heads.
"If you two are going to play," she said, "then for goodness sake, go on inside. Come on. Both of you." She picked up
my mother and reached for the other girl's hand, but before she could say anything more, the girl was in a full sprint,
her long legs like a whippet's as she vanished down the street.
Gramps was beside himself when he heard what had happened. He interrogated my mother, wrote down names. The
next day he took the morning off from work to visit the school principal. He personally called the parents of some of
the offending children to give them a piece of his mind. And from every adult that he spoke to, he received the same
response:
"You best talk to your daughter, Mr. Dunham. White girls don't play with coloreds in this town."