In my twenties in San Francisco I became a sophisticate and an acting agnostic. It wasn’t that I had stopped believing in God; it’s just that God didn’t seem to be around the neighborhoods I frequented. And then a voice teacher introduced me to Lessons in Truth, published by the Unity School of Christianity.
One day the teacher, Frederick Wilkerson, asked me to read to him. I was twenty-four, very erudite, very worldly. He asked that I read from Lessons in Truth, a section which ended with these words: “God loves me.” I read the piece and closed the book, and the teacher said, “Read it again.” I pointedly opened the book, and I sarcastically read, “God loves me.” He said, “Again.” After about the seventh repetition I began to sense that there might be truth in the statement, that there was a possibility that God really did love me. Me, Maya Angelou. I suddenly began to cry at the grandness of it all. I knew that if God loved me, then I could do wonderful things, I could try great things, learn anything, achieve anything. For what could stand against me with God, since one person, any person with God, constitutes the majority?
That knowledge humbles me, melts my bones, closes my ears, and makes my teeth rock loosely in their gums. And it also liberates me. I am a big bird winging over high mountains, down into serene valleys. I am ripples of waves on silver seas. I’m a spring leaf trembling in anticipation.
Further New Directions
Some people who exist sparingly on the mean side of the hill are threatened by those who also live in the shadows but who celebrate the light.
It seems easier to lie prone than to press against the law of gravity and raise the body onto its feet and persist in remaining vertical.
There are many incidents which can eviscerate the stalwart and bring the mighty down. In order to survive, the ample soul needs refreshments and reminders daily of its right to be and to be wherever it finds itself.
I was fired from a job when I was sixteen years old and was devastated. My entire personal worth was laid waste. My mother found me crying in my upstairs room. (I had left the door ajar, hoping for consolation.)
She tapped at the door and stepped in. When she asked why I was crying, I told her what happened.
Her face suddenly became radiant with indulgent smiles. She sat down on my bed and took me into her arms.
“Fired? Fired?” She laughed. “What the hell is that? Nothing. Tomorrow you’ll go looking for another job. That’s all.”
She dabbed at my tears with her handkerchief. “So what? Remember, you were looking for a job when you found the one you just lost. So you’ll just be looking for a job one more time.”
She laughed at her wisdom and my youthful consternation. “And think about it, if you ever get fired again, the boss won’t be getting a cherry. You’ve been through it once, and survived.”
My mother, the late Vivian Baxter, retired from the merchant marine as a member of the Marine Cooks and Stewards Union. She practiced stepping off the expected road and cutting herself a brand-new path any time the desire arose. She inspired me to write the poem “Mrs. V. B.”
Ships?
Sure I’ll sail them.
Show me the boat,
If it’ll float,
I’ll sail it.
Men?
Yes I’ll love them.
If they’ve got style,
To make me smile,
I’ll love them.
Life?
’Course I’ll live it.
Just enough breath,
Until my death,
And I’ll live it.
Failure?
I’m not ashamed to tell it,
I never learned to spell it.
Not Failure.
Complaining
When my grandmother was raising me in Stamps, Arkansas, she had a particular routine when people who were known to be whiners entered her store. Whenever she saw a known complainer coming, she would call me from whatever I was doing and say conspiratorially, “Sister, come inside. Come.” Of course I would obey.
My grandmother would ask the customer, “How are you doing today, Brother Thomas?” And the person would reply, “Not so good.” There would be a distinct whine in the voice. “Not so good today, Sister Henderson. You see, it’s this summer. It’s this summer heat. I just hate it. Oh, I hate it so much. It just frazzles me up and frazzles me down. I just hate the heat. It’s almost killing me.” Then my grandmother would stand stoically, her arms folded, and mumble, “Uh-huh, uh-huh.” And she would cut her eyes at me to make certain that I had heard the lamentation.
At another time a whiner would mewl, “I hate plowing. That packed-down dirt ain’t got no reasoning, and mules ain’t got good sense.… Sure ain’t. It’s killing me. I can’t ever seem to get done. My feet and my hands stay sore, and I get dirt in my eyes and up my nose. I just can’t stand it.” And my grandmother, again stoically with her arms folded, would say, “Uh-huh, uh-huh,” and then look at me and nod.
As soon as the complainer was out of the store, my grandmother would call me to stand in front of her. And then she would say the same thing she had said at least a thousand times, it seemed to me. “Sister, did you hear what Brother So-and-So or Sister Much-to-Do complained about? You heard that?” And I would nod. Mamma would continue, “Sister, there are people who went to sleep all over the world last night, poor and rich and white and black, but they will never wake again. Sister, those who expected to rise did not, their beds became their cooling boards and their blankets became their winding sheets. And those dead folks would give anything, anything at all for just five minutes of this weather or ten minutes of that plowing that person was grumbling about. So you watch yourself about complaining, Sister. What you’re supposed to do when you don’t like a thing is change it. If you can’t change it, change the way you think about it. Don’t complain.”
It is said that persons have few teachable moments in their lives. Mamma seemed to have caught me at each one I had between the ages of three and thirteen. Whining is not only graceless, but can be dangerous. It can alert a brute that a victim is in the neighborhood.
At Harvesttime
There is an immutable life principle with which many people will quarrel.
Although nature has proven season in and season out that if the thing that is planted bears at all, it will yield more of itself, there are those who seem certain that if they plant tomato seeds, at harvesttime they can reap onions.
Too many times for comfort I have expected to reap good when I know I have sown evil. My lame excuse is that I have not always known that actions can only reproduce themselves, or rather, I have not always allowed myself to be aware of that knowledge. Now, after years of observation and enough courage to admit what I have observed, I try to plant peace if I do not want discord; to plant loyalty and honesty if I want to avoid betrayal and lies.
Of course, there is no absolute assurance that those things I plant will always fall upon arable land and will take root and grow, nor can I know if another cultivator did not leave contrary seeds before I arrived. I do know, however, that if I leave little to chance, if I am careful about the kinds of seeds I plant, about their potency and nature, I can, within reason, trust my expectations.
Sensual Encouragement
We were young and lithe. Our brown bodies shone with heavy applications of baby oil and Max Factor theatrical makeup. Alvin Ailey and I were ardent students of Modern Dance, and when we could, we hired ourselves out as the dance team Al & Rita. Our most frequent employers were the secret and mysterious black organizations. When the Elks, the Masons, and the Eastern Stars gave socials, they always provided small bands, torch singers, and shake dancers for their membership.
Besides makeup, Alvin wore a leopard print G-string and I wore a homemade costume of a few feathers and even fewer sequins. We danced to Duke Ellington’s “Caravan.” Alvin had choreographed the routine, and he, as Pasha, would count out the first four bars of music, then leap from the dark onto the lighted stage. I, as t
he Pasha’s dancing girl, would wait in the dark while he established the mood.
Inevitably, I would find women’s hands on my body. Three or four would stroke my back, pat my behind, caress my arms. This was always accompanied by their whispers.
“That’s right, honey. You’re pretty. Go out there and shake that thang.”
“When I was young, I used to shake it. I mean, shake it.”
“Go on, baby. Get out there and drive him crazy.”
So encouraged, I could barely await my cue, and when it did come, I would explode onto the stage and try to shake my brains out.
Looking back, I realize that the women’s strokings were sensual rather than sexual. Because they encouraged me, they participated with me in the dance. Because they had enjoyed themselves when they were younglings, they did not envy me my youth.
Many adults show impatience with the young. They want them not only to grow up, but to grow old, and that immediately. They are quick to chide, criticize, and admonish:
“Be quiet.”
“Sit down.”
“Why are you always wiggling?”
“Keep still.”
Whether consciously or not, those admonishments stem from a vigorous dissatisfaction with life and regret for a misspent youth.
Voices of Respect
African Americans as slaves could not even claim to have won the names given to them in haste and given without a care, but they pridefully possessed a quality which modified the barbarism of their lives. They awoke before sunrise to be in the fields at first light and trudged back to floorless cabins in the evening’s gloom. They had little chance for amicable exchange in the rows of cotton and the stands of sugarcane; still, they devised ways of keeping their souls robust and spirits alive in that awful atmosphere. They employed formally familial terms when addressing each other. Neither the slaveowner nor the slave overseer was likely to speak to a servant in anything but the cruelest language. But in the slave society Mariah became Aunt Mariah and Joe became Uncle Joe. Young girls were called Sister, Sis, or Tutta. Boys became Brother, Bubba, and Bro and Buddy. It is true that those terms used throughout the slave communities had had their roots in the African worlds from which the slaves had been torn, but under bondage they began to have greater meaning and a more powerful impact. As in every society, certain tones of voice were and still are used to establish the quality of communication between the speaker and the person addressed. When African Americans choose to speak sweetly to each other, not only do the voices fall in register, but there is an unconscious increase in music between the speakers. In fact, a conversation between friends can sound as melodic as a scripted song.
We have used these terms to help us survive slavery, its aftermath, and today’s crisis of revived racism. However, now, when too many children run mad in the land, and now, when we need courtesy as much as or more than ever, and when a little tenderness between people could make life more bearable, we are losing even the appearance of courtesy. Our youth, finding little or no courtesy at home, make exodus into streets filled with violent self-revulsion and an exploding vulgarity.
We must re-create an attractive and caring attitude in our homes and in our worlds. If our children are to approve of themselves, they must see that we approve of ourselves. If we persist in self-disrespect and then ask our children to respect themselves, it is as if we break all their bones and then insist that they win Olympic gold medals for the hundred-yard dash.
Outrageous.
Extending the Boundaries
Terry’s Pub was my pub, and it was the place to be if you were black and hip and in New York City. The bartenders were paragons of urban elegance, mixing and serving drinks smoothly and participating in conversations which ranged in subject matter from whether China should be allowed in the UN to the proper length of a micromini skirt.
The regulars were writers, models, high school principals, actors, journalists, movie actors, musicians, and college professors.
One afternoon I entered Terry’s to find myself surrounded by well-wishers with wide smiles and loud congratulations.
The bartender showed me the New York Post and then presented me with a huge martini. I was featured as the newspaper’s “Person of the Week.” The regulars suspended their usual world-weary demeanor, giving hearty compliments, which I accepted heartily.
Eventually the toasters returned to their tables and I was left to grow gloomy in silence. Moodiness and a creeping drunkenness from too many martinis dimmed the room and my spirits.
Here, in my finest hour, I was alone. What had I done to any man to make him want to leave me and, even worse, not to win me to his side in the first place?
The questions came in the order of a military phalanx. Each marched into my consciousness, was recognized, and proceeded to make way for the next. I ordered another martini and resolved to soberly answer the inquiries. I was forty-one years old, slender, tall, and was often thought to be around thirty. No one had ever called me beautiful, save the odd Africanist who told me I looked like an African statue. Having seen many Yoruba and Fon wooden sculptures, I was not lured into believing myself anything but rather plain. I did dress strikingly and walked straight, my head evenly upon my shoulders, so kind people often said of me, “That’s a handsome woman.”
But here I was between affairs and alone. Like many women, I did regard the absence of a romantic liaison as a stigma which showed me unlovable.
I sat at the bar, mumbling over my inadequacies and drinking at least the fifth martini, when my roving eye fell on a table. Near the window sat five young, smart, black male journalists enjoying each other’s company. They had been among the people who crowded around me earlier when the day had been bright, my present glorious, and my future assured. But they also had retreated, gone back to the comfort of their own table.
A tear slipped down my cheek. I called the bartender to settle my bill, but he informed me that all had been taken care of, anonymously. With that pronouncement of kindness before me and the self-pitying thoughts behind me, I gathered my purse and, removing myself from the stool, gingerly pointed myself in the direction of the journalists’ table. The men looked up, saw my drunkenness, and became alarmed and guarded.
I pulled a chair from another table and asked, “Do you mind if I join you?”
I sat and looked at each man for a long time, and then I began a performance which now, more than twenty years later, can still cause me to seriously consider changing my name and my country of residence.
I asked of the table at large, “What is wrong with me? I know I’m not pretty, but I’m not the ugliest woman in the world. And if I was, I’d still deserve having a man of my own.”
I began to list my virtues.
“I keep a beautiful house, tables polished, fresh flowers, even if daisies, at least once a week.
“I’m an excellent cook.
“I can manage my house and an outside job without keeling over in a dead faint.
“I enjoy sex and have what I hope is a normal appetite.
“I can speak French and Spanish, some Arabic and Fanti, and I read all the papers and journals and a book a week so that I can share an intelligent conversation with you.
“And none of all that appeals to you?”
I raised my voice. “Do you mean to tell me that that’s not enough for you?”
The men were embarrassed and angry with themselves at being embarrassed. Angry with me for having brought such unwieldy, drunken, awkward questions to their table.
In one second I realized that I had done just what they feared of me. That I had overstepped the unwritten rules which I knew I should have respected. Instead, I had brazenly and boldly come to their table and spoken out on, of all things, loneliness.
When I realized my intoxication, I started to cry. An acquaintance at the bar walked over to our silent table. He greeted the men and asked, “Maya, sister, can I walk you home?” I looked up into his dark brown face and began to recov
er. His presence seemed to sober me a little. I found a handkerchief in my purse, and without rushing, I dabbed my face. I stood up and away from the table. I said, “Good-bye, gentlemen,” and took my rescuer’s hand. We walked out of the bar.
The long block to home was made longer by my companion’s disapproving sounds. He clucked his tongue and muttered. “You shouldn’t be drinking martinis. Especially by yourself.” I didn’t have the will to remind him that I thought I had been with friends.
He continued.… “You draw people to you; then you push them away.”
I sure didn’t have to push the journalists away.
“You give that big smile and act like you’re just waiting for a man to take you in his arms, but then you freeze up like an iceberg.… People don’t know how to take you.” Well, they must not. I hadn’t been taken.
We arrived at my apartment, and I gave my attendant the sweetest, briefest smile I had in me and stepped inside and closed the door.
I entered into a long concentration which lasted until and even after I sobered myself.
At the end of my meditation I came to understand that I had been looking for love, but only under specific conditions. I was looking for a mate, but he had to be a certain color, he had to have a certain intellect. I had standards. It was just likely that my standards eliminated a number of possibilities.
I had married a Greek in my green youth, and the marriage had ended poorly, so I had not consciously thought of accepting any more advances from outside my own race. The real reason, or I think another reason, for not including non—African Americans in my target area was that I knew that if it was difficult to sustain a love affair between people who had grown up next door and who looked alike and whose parents had attended church together, how much more so between people from different races who had so few things in common.