Read Online Ordinary Light A Memoir (N) by Tracy K. Smith - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Tracy K. Smith
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for her elders was alive in the mom I knew at home in California, the one who took me with her on visits to the convalescent home, where we chatted with old ladies whose children were busy with other things.
One evening Mom and Mother came home with bags of groceries, fixings for a big meal and a fresh cake or two. My uncle Slade was on his way home from college for a visit, and we were going to sit up and listen to his stories. I was excited. My mother told me her brother was “crazy,” but she said it in a way I knew meant he was funny, a jokester, like other of my uncles, someonewho could rouse everyone to laughter. Slade, who was near Dinah in age, maybe a bit older, maybe a bit younger, was going to be successful; everyone knew it and said it and spoke about him with unfettered pride. I thought of him as someone I’d like, someone like my brothers, for whom I felt a similar admiration.
Slade was small, only about as tall as my mom. He had a big, strong voice and my mom’s broad smile. That night after dinner, sitting on the couch that would unfold into his bed for the night, he’d told story after story about his life at school, stories about growing up in Leroy, stories I didn’t understand but that I laughed at anyway, just glad for the chance to lean back into my mother’s arms full of ease and mirth. His stories triggered other stories, too, even ones that were about his brothers and sisters who weren’t there with us. It was as if this small group of siblings coming together—three of thirteen—had brought the whole family into being, just like Jesus said in the Bible, Where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them .
In one story, the schools had recently been integrated, and the black school that my aunts and uncles and mom had attended quite happily was disbanded. The teachers who knew them because they lived side by side as neighbors or even family were shuffled to other places, and the children were bused off to schools where for the first time they’d be learning alongside whites. It had meant buying one pair of shoes for each of the school-aged children, kids used to running around outdoors in bare feet, no matter the weather. Once, my uncle Carl made the mistake of leaving his oxfords on the heater overnight, and when he woke up in the morning, the rubber soles had melted. (I pictured them warped and liquidy, just like what had happened to Dinah’s record of “Le Freak.”) He’d had to squeeze his feet into a Sunday pair belonging to his sister Willa.
Uncle Slade remembered how, much later, after most of my aunts and some of my uncles had moved up North to New York, his brother Samuel had been threatened by an acquaintance. It probably had to do with money, but whatever the cause, my aunt Gladys caught wind of it and tried to set things straight for her brother by getting her hands on a pair of brass knuckles and showing up at the man’s door wielding them.
Stories that, in another context, could have been viewed as sad or dangerous were occasions for joy on that night. And it was true that they somehow brought the rest of the family, even Daddy Herbert, back together.
“I saw me a pretty lady,” Uncle Slade said once my eyes started growing heavy. He was mimicking a comedian on the circuit down in Louisiana, where he was in college. “I saw me a pretty lady,” he continued, “and I said to myself, ‘I’m gonna give that pretty lady a rose, and then I’m gonna sock it to her. ’ ” It made no sense to me, but the music of it, the way those last four words kicked up in volume and dipped down in pitch, once again picked us all up and whisked us into laughter. My mom said it, too, later that night in reference to another story, “So why don’t you go on and sock it to her ?” And we’d laughed again. My laughter was built upon visceral bliss; I still had no idea what the joke meant or why it was funny. It just caught me up in the glee everybody else’s
One evening Mom and Mother came home with bags of groceries, fixings for a big meal and a fresh cake or two. My uncle Slade was on his way home from college for a visit, and we were going to sit up and listen to his stories. I was excited. My mother told me her brother was “crazy,” but she said it in a way I knew meant he was funny, a jokester, like other of my uncles, someonewho could rouse everyone to laughter. Slade, who was near Dinah in age, maybe a bit older, maybe a bit younger, was going to be successful; everyone knew it and said it and spoke about him with unfettered pride. I thought of him as someone I’d like, someone like my brothers, for whom I felt a similar admiration.
Slade was small, only about as tall as my mom. He had a big, strong voice and my mom’s broad smile. That night after dinner, sitting on the couch that would unfold into his bed for the night, he’d told story after story about his life at school, stories about growing up in Leroy, stories I didn’t understand but that I laughed at anyway, just glad for the chance to lean back into my mother’s arms full of ease and mirth. His stories triggered other stories, too, even ones that were about his brothers and sisters who weren’t there with us. It was as if this small group of siblings coming together—three of thirteen—had brought the whole family into being, just like Jesus said in the Bible, Where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them .
In one story, the schools had recently been integrated, and the black school that my aunts and uncles and mom had attended quite happily was disbanded. The teachers who knew them because they lived side by side as neighbors or even family were shuffled to other places, and the children were bused off to schools where for the first time they’d be learning alongside whites. It had meant buying one pair of shoes for each of the school-aged children, kids used to running around outdoors in bare feet, no matter the weather. Once, my uncle Carl made the mistake of leaving his oxfords on the heater overnight, and when he woke up in the morning, the rubber soles had melted. (I pictured them warped and liquidy, just like what had happened to Dinah’s record of “Le Freak.”) He’d had to squeeze his feet into a Sunday pair belonging to his sister Willa.
Uncle Slade remembered how, much later, after most of my aunts and some of my uncles had moved up North to New York, his brother Samuel had been threatened by an acquaintance. It probably had to do with money, but whatever the cause, my aunt Gladys caught wind of it and tried to set things straight for her brother by getting her hands on a pair of brass knuckles and showing up at the man’s door wielding them.
Stories that, in another context, could have been viewed as sad or dangerous were occasions for joy on that night. And it was true that they somehow brought the rest of the family, even Daddy Herbert, back together.
“I saw me a pretty lady,” Uncle Slade said once my eyes started growing heavy. He was mimicking a comedian on the circuit down in Louisiana, where he was in college. “I saw me a pretty lady,” he continued, “and I said to myself, ‘I’m gonna give that pretty lady a rose, and then I’m gonna sock it to her. ’ ” It made no sense to me, but the music of it, the way those last four words kicked up in volume and dipped down in pitch, once again picked us all up and whisked us into laughter. My mom said it, too, later that night in reference to another story, “So why don’t you go on and sock it to her ?” And we’d laughed again. My laughter was built upon visceral bliss; I still had no idea what the joke meant or why it was funny. It just caught me up in the glee everybody else’s
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