To me, the black black woman is our essential mother, the blacker she is the more us she is and to see the hatred that is turned on her is enough to make me despair, almost entirely, of our future as a people. ↗
My mother was very strong. Once, she picked up a coconut and smashed it against my father's head. It taught me about women defending themselves and not collapsing in a heap. ↗
I was trying to manage school and training for the Olympics and ended up not doing well at either. That was a big lesson in my life. My mother expected both. ↗
My grandmother made her home at Fox How under the shelter of the fells, with her four daughters, the youngest of whom was only eight when their father died. ↗
For example, when my mother died, the people who showed up just to put an apron on to cook, people who really do the right thing, so to speak, as my momma would always say to show that they care, a sense of community that we've lost so much in our country. ↗
After my mother died, I found, a little book of hers which recorded everything I had ever done, how I had done it, and how proud she was of her son Conrad. ↗
