My instincts told me that the logical thing to do was to find some kind of way to get Freddie to like me. But no matter what I did, his response was to beat me down, often literally. Ophelia and I almost never got whippings when we lived with Uncle Archie and TT, but with Freddie we all got whupped all the time, usually for no good reason other than he was an illiterate, belligerent, abusive, and complete drunk.

Initially, I thought Freddie might be proud of my academic success. At five, six, and seven years old, school was a haven for me, a place where I seemed to thrive at learning and in social interactions. My early exposure to books paid off, and with Momma’s continuing encouragement, I quickly mastered reading. One of my favorite teachers, Mrs. Broderick, reinforced my love of books by frequently asking me to read aloud—longer than any of my classmates. Since we didn’t have a television at this time, reading became all the more meaningful at home, especially because Momma loved to sit down after her long day of working as a domestic to hear what I had read or learned that day.

My mother still clung to the hope that she would one day obtain the necessary schooling and licensing to teach in the state of Wisconsin. Until that time, she devoted herself to doing what she had to do to take care of her four children—Ophelia, myself, Sharon, and the youngest, my baby sister Kim, who arrived in this time period. While Momma didn’t complain about her days spent cleaning rich (white) people’s houses, she didn’t talk about her work either, instead living vicariously through reports of what my teachers had taught that day or by looking with me at some of the picture storybooks that I brought home. The Red Balloon was one book that I could read over and over, sitting next to Momma and showing her the photographic illustrations of a magical city where a little boy and his red balloon went flying, exploring the rooftops. Momma’s eyes lit up with a beautiful serenity, as if she was somewhere up in the clouds, maybe dreaming of being that balloon and flying up, up, and away. I never knew that the magical city in the story was a place called Paris in a country called France. And I certainly had no idea that I would visit Paris on several occasions.

My accomplishments as an elementary school student obviously made Moms proud. But if I ever fooled myself into thinking this was going to win me points with Freddie, I was sadly mistaken. In fact, Freddie Triplett—who could not read or write to save his life—spent every minute waging a one-man antiliteracy campaign. In his early thirties at this time, Freddie had stopped his schooling in the third grade back in Mississippi and couldn’t even dial a telephone until later in his life, and he could barely do it then. This undoubtedly fed a deep-seated insecurity in him that he covered up by declaring that anybody who could read or write was a “slick motherfucker.”