again, unable to stay longer. Papa and Mr. Morrison filled their days with winter chores—mending tools and making new ones, and on milder days stringing fences and chopping wood—and talked of spring and the fields. Big Ma, who enjoyed every season, settled down to her winter quilting, spreading out the pieces of her pattern by the fire as soon as breakfast and the morning chores were finished, to sew and talk with other women of the community until it was time to put supper on. As for Mama, she had her students to keep her busy.
Since the school year had begun in the fall, Little Willie and Clarence had been stopping by afternoons to ask Mama’s help; now the number of students who came by daily after school had grown, and Mama practically ran a school after school. And she loved it. While the weather was still good, she often sat right on the front lawn, her legs folded beneath her, her students gathered around. Now in winter they filled the sitting area in the hour or two they could snatch before attending to their evening chores as Mama patiently explained what they did not understand. On Saturdays she actually taught lessons of her own in addition to reviewing the lessons of other teachers and, frankly, I was somewhat amazed by how many students sacrificed a morning free of school to come.
As January became February and February mellowed toward March, the boys and I looked forward to the last day of school, which would come at mid-March. School usually ended at this time so that students could return to the fieldsfor spring planting. Had the school year extended any longer, classrooms would have been empty, for cotton sustained life, and no matter how greatly learning was respected, the cotton had to be planted, chopped, weeded, and picked if the family was to survive. Few parents expected their children to do any work other than what they and their parents had done, and education was usually sacrificed if a choice had to be made between it and the fields. Students knew this and understood it, and because they knew nothing else, for the most part did not resent it. But there were some boys and girls, like Moe Turner, who, though they did not know what else they could do outside of farming, knew that they did not want to spend their lives sharecropping, and each year they planned their escape from it.
“We gonna make it this year all right,” Moe said for the third year in a row as we walked from school. “I mean it this time. Papa and me, we figurin’ on planting ten acres in cotton. Crop come good, we can get off ole man Montier’s place.”
My comment to that ridiculous statement was: “Boy, you know good and well y’all ain’t hardly gonna—”
“Cassie, wouldja hush!”
I cut my eyes at Stacey and grew silent, not out of any resignation to his so-called authority but because I figured if he wanted to let Moe continue to delude himself about this sharecropping business, then that was up to him. Yet he knew as well as I did that there was little chance of Moe’s family going anywhere at the end of cotton picking. The Turners had sharecropped on the Montier plantation since the 1880’s and it was less than likely that one good crop would free them from doing the same for another year.
As sharecroppers they were tied to the land for as long as Mr. Montier wanted them there. Mr. Montier providedeverything for them—their land, their mule, their plow, their seed—in return for a portion of their cotton. When they needed food or other supplies, they bought on credit at a store approved by Mr. Montier where high interest rates upped the price tremendously on everything they bought. At year’s end, when all the cotton had been sold and the accounts were figured by Mr. Montier, the Turners were usually in more debt than they had been at the beginning of the year. And as long as they were in debt, they could not just up and leave the land on their own, not unless they wanted the sheriff after them. And
Since the school year had begun in the fall, Little Willie and Clarence had been stopping by afternoons to ask Mama’s help; now the number of students who came by daily after school had grown, and Mama practically ran a school after school. And she loved it. While the weather was still good, she often sat right on the front lawn, her legs folded beneath her, her students gathered around. Now in winter they filled the sitting area in the hour or two they could snatch before attending to their evening chores as Mama patiently explained what they did not understand. On Saturdays she actually taught lessons of her own in addition to reviewing the lessons of other teachers and, frankly, I was somewhat amazed by how many students sacrificed a morning free of school to come.
As January became February and February mellowed toward March, the boys and I looked forward to the last day of school, which would come at mid-March. School usually ended at this time so that students could return to the fieldsfor spring planting. Had the school year extended any longer, classrooms would have been empty, for cotton sustained life, and no matter how greatly learning was respected, the cotton had to be planted, chopped, weeded, and picked if the family was to survive. Few parents expected their children to do any work other than what they and their parents had done, and education was usually sacrificed if a choice had to be made between it and the fields. Students knew this and understood it, and because they knew nothing else, for the most part did not resent it. But there were some boys and girls, like Moe Turner, who, though they did not know what else they could do outside of farming, knew that they did not want to spend their lives sharecropping, and each year they planned their escape from it.
“We gonna make it this year all right,” Moe said for the third year in a row as we walked from school. “I mean it this time. Papa and me, we figurin’ on planting ten acres in cotton. Crop come good, we can get off ole man Montier’s place.”
My comment to that ridiculous statement was: “Boy, you know good and well y’all ain’t hardly gonna—”
“Cassie, wouldja hush!”
I cut my eyes at Stacey and grew silent, not out of any resignation to his so-called authority but because I figured if he wanted to let Moe continue to delude himself about this sharecropping business, then that was up to him. Yet he knew as well as I did that there was little chance of Moe’s family going anywhere at the end of cotton picking. The Turners had sharecropped on the Montier plantation since the 1880’s and it was less than likely that one good crop would free them from doing the same for another year.
As sharecroppers they were tied to the land for as long as Mr. Montier wanted them there. Mr. Montier providedeverything for them—their land, their mule, their plow, their seed—in return for a portion of their cotton. When they needed food or other supplies, they bought on credit at a store approved by Mr. Montier where high interest rates upped the price tremendously on everything they bought. At year’s end, when all the cotton had been sold and the accounts were figured by Mr. Montier, the Turners were usually in more debt than they had been at the beginning of the year. And as long as they were in debt, they could not just up and leave the land on their own, not unless they wanted the sheriff after them. And
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