Mama Said

Chapter 1

"Stella girl, you may as well named that girl Zabelle when you nicknamed her Dixie, after that road-running sister of yours."

I heard Mama's best friend, Miss Bernice, running her mouth again about Mama's oldest sister who had run away with some man to LA for city life. "I'm telling you Gay, you better corral some of that spirit in that young'un honey sauce cause you're headed for a heap of trouble"

Mama interrupted her by saying how good I could clean, she had just started to teach me to cook.

"You need not try hushing me up honey cause as sure as my name Bernice, that gals gon bring tears to your eyes one day. Look at her."

I had just made them know I was standing at the kitchen entrance. I thought Miss Bernice would stop her talk, she kept right on.

"Look at that gal, a blooming brown beauty, titties blossoming , butt sitting up there firm and tender. Child, I'm telling you, those hound dogs gon' be around in just a minute." She was straightening Mama's hair in the kitchen. Mama raised up, Miss Bernice burnt her ear.

"Watch what you're doing Bernice. Dixie, go find something to do, us grown folks are talkin."

"Yea, about me." I said under my breath.

You see," said Miss Bernice. "She's already talkin back."

Mama yelled, "Go on girl!" Besides Mama's best friend, Bernice was the town's only Negro beautician. A short, stocky, dust brown skinned woman with cock eyes who kept up most of the mess around town.

El Centro is a small California farming town which sits between the Arizona and Mexican border. It only had a population of about 100 Black Americans in 1958. I had just turned 13 years old. I am the third child of four and the second daughter born to my mother and father. My mother, a bona fide Christian, and a community activists , who was the most charitable person I have yet to meet. Mama could make the locust stop humming when she sang. She had the richest sounding soprano voice I have ever heard. Mama a beautiful, slim, golden-tan skinned woman, married my father when she was nineteen. They say she married up.

My father was a Cook, which meant something to the folks in town. Daddy's father owned the largest farm in the county. My father was the third child, first son of eight children born to Nauicligas and Nellie Cook. My father was a handsome man, who had a burning desire to leave the country.

He told me a story about being invited to go on an overnight trip to play baseball. He said he hadn't given much thought to where they would play, he was just glad to be spending a night away from home. He was fifteen years old before he found out that there where other towns and even cites beside the Imperial Valley. He dreamed of leaving the farm and becoming a big league ball player. Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier, so he felt there was a chance for him in the Major Leagues. And away off the farm, he worked hard perfecting his pitching, but the white scouts didn't choose Daddy during his senior year, so he went to work for odd jobs in town.

Hew was determined to follow his dream until Miss Helen's daughter Ruth came up pregnant. Miss Helen wanted him to marry her daughter to give the baby a name. My father's mother said it wasn't going to happen, "It ain't gon' be no shot gun wedding here. If he don't love her, he sho ain't gonna marry her to give the baby a name. The best he can do is take care of the child. Force it for what?!" What my grandmother said went.

She was a robust women, affectionately called 'Mama' by all. A pretty woman with golden brown skin, silky coal black hair, she was part Cherokee Indian. Strong as a man, she'd be up by 1:30am, have the hogs slopped, cows milked, and two meals cooked by the two hours before sunrise.

Daddy's father was just the opposite. He was a good ole Southern Baptist preacher. Papa Cook reminded me of Step'n Fech't, a dark, small-framed man with nappy hair circling a shiny bald spot on the top of his head. He walked slow, talked slow, and slept between each bite of food. His life was his family farm and preaching the gospel at Ezekiel Baptist Church.

Life on the farms I knew was wonderful. I can remember Papa taking us to the canal to draw water from their well. He would fill the well up every Saturday. In the evening, Mama would heat water in a large tin tub, which for us was bath time. She'd put two kids in at a time. I always tried to be one of the first two since it there were four others trying to use the same water.

Mama's and Papa's house sat smack dab in the middle of the 105 acres of land. It was a two bedroom house with a kitchen, living room, and dining room. The outhouse served as a bathroom, something I could never bare to use. When I needed to do a number two, Mama would dig a hole somewhere in the backyard, That's where I did my business. Grandmother stood near with her Sears catalogue, which she used when there wasn't any toilet paper, waiting and fussing about my not wanting to use the outhouse. My fear was maybe I'd fall in and plus in stunk. They did have electricity but most of our nights were spent sitting around coal oil lamps listening to Bible stories, singing or playing checkers. Mama popped popcorn she'd dried from the corn harvest. She'd drench it with some good ole home churned butter and served ice cold Kool Aide to wash it down with. Almost every night there would be a different treat.

Papa would sit around napping, trying to figure out how to "stay on top of things". He leased his land to white farmers because they couldn't afford to buy seeds, hire the field hands, and also pay for the note on his land. It gave him and his son's jobs, plus it kept food on his table, and it also fed his livestock. After each crop was plowed, he'd put them out to graze. The money he saved was used to plant hay each year, which was turned around and sold to other farmers.

Harvesting hay was a big event around their house. That was the only time Papa got to plant on his own land. Mama woke up before everybody, packed their lunches, made a big canister of ice water, cooked breakfast and woke everybody up in the house. Which was around 3am. Papa came out glistening black, revealing his stainless white teeth through a rare broad smile.

"Well Nellie, with God's help we made it again this year." Papa was trying to pay his farm off so he could start growing his own crops. He was dressed in Levi's and raw hide shafts and cowboy boots. We'd sit down to the table to eat. Papa prayed first thanking God for enabling him to put food on the table for the nourishment of our bodies, "Thank you Father for putting a roof over the heads of my family", then he thanked Him for the land out yonder that yielded all that beautiful hay. "More than grateful, Lord, more than thankful, humble for my beautiful family, Sir." Then he'd bless the food again and the wonderful hands that prepared it. This was the only day Papa didn't fall asleep at the table that I can remember.

He'd eat real quick and grab his old sweat stained hat. "What ya'll waiting on? That hays gon' dry up right under our feet if we don't get going.