Promises

By Carolyn Roosth

Helen Johnston believes that if she'd been born as anything other than a black girl in the south, she would have been a mockingbird. Helen and her two sisters are children of parents who've spent their lives farming cotton. When the cotton industry changes, the family seeks a new start in the city. Life lessons from school and home revolve around honesty, dependability, and education. Helen is also inspired by her mother's childhood stories. Facing tragedies and desertions, Helen makes promises to help her cope with reality. Family and friends are strong and positive influences in helping her regain control. Her singing and music abilities become an important bridge toward accomplishing her goals.

You'll find Helen, teaching and helping to solve a mystery, in DENIAL.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Carolyn Roosth
• Release date: Mar 6, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310974502

Carolyn Roosth

I grew up on a farm outside a small East Texas town. I graduated from the University of Houston with a BA in English and Speech and completed my Masters of Education at the University of Texas in Tyler, Texas. My twenty-two years spent in teaching ranged from stints in elementary, middle school, and high school to graduate level at the University. An avid reader, I believe that reading is a wonderful educational doorway to the world. My husband and I are both retired and enjoy traveling, hiking, snorkeling, and watching movies. You can find my books in print at CreateSpace.com.

Book preview

One

Mama should have been a writer. That would have been a hard job for her with only a sixth-grade education, but she could weave a story tighter than a piece of silk cloth. She often told me and my sisters stories of how difficult and harsh life was when she was growing up. Maybe she wanted us to not feel sorry for ourselves in the really soft and easy life we led. But I really think she just wanted to relive the happy times of her childhood, soaked as they were in her family’s poverty and gloom.

Mama should have been a boy. After all, many of the stories she told made me believe she was more of a tomboy than a girl. Start with her mop of straight hair. Yes, I said straight hair, as unusual as it was for a black to have straight hair. On top of that, she cut it short to just above her ears. And those ears shoulda belonged to a boy or maybe a small cream pitcher. Even though she had the looks of a boy, she had the soul and nurturing spirit of a woman.

Mama should have been a rooster, because she never let the sun get a jump on her rising, she said, even as a child. She spent most of her summer days out in whatever cotton patch her family was picking on a particular day of any week. She was also obliged to learn other jobs that a brother would have done, such as driving the tractor or slopping the hogs, besides making the meager meals around the house. Mama never complained about doing the work she did because it was something just had to be done, even after her own mama had up and left her and her two sisters with their daddy when Mama was just thirteen years old.

Daddy should have been a teacher. He had all the patience of a saint and a way of explaining things so you could really get a grip on the subject. Though he never was able to go to school any longer than Mama did, he had the finest handwriting you’ve ever seen. And Daddy always encouraged us girls to get a good education—the most important thing in the world.

Daddy should have been a preacher because he knew exactly what was right and what was wrong. But you knew not to expect any mercy from him if you were in the wrong. Even if he came home from the fields and Mama told him I’d done something bad, he meted out the punishment as if he’d witnessed my bad behavior himself. He’d most likely say to me to go get him a switch out of the field, and he’d take it to my backside. Then, if I’d done something really, really awful (according to Mama) he’d pull off his belt or get his razor strap—oh so much worse a whipping than with the thin switches I brought in.

Daddy should have been a movie star because of his good looks. First off, he was a good six feet four inches tall and never weighed over a hundred seventy pounds. When Mama stood beside him, she didn’t even come up to his shoulders. His reddish hair didn’t take away from the perfectly straight and regal nose sitting just beneath his piercing brown eyes. Nobody could ever account for the color of his hair, but my cousins said Mama must have tried to bleach it out. I think it was mostly the sun that did the bleaching. In middle school, I even heard rumors that there must have been a drop of white in Daddy’s gene pool. If that were true, it had to have come from some awesome couple like Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings. My most perfect and vivid memory of Daddy is of him dressed in his overalls and straw hat sitting smiling and proud atop the red Farmall tractor.

Daddy should have been a mule. He spent his days sunup to sundown outdoors, either cultivating the cotton, pulling corn, butchering hogs, or milking cows. I’ll swear he did the work of three men and still got up with a smile to do it over again the next day. And never mind that he was not even working his own land. He was working his daddy’s land and taking care of our family with the chickens, pigs, cows, and garden that kept us all fed.

Mama liked to tell the story of how she and her family came sharecropping all the way from East Texas down to Longmoore, Texas, during the long hot summer of 1954. Daddy was sent out extra early to greet the workers, set their wages, and show them the small cabin attached to a cistern for their overnight stays. The big field the other side of the woods from their cabin held about fifty acres of cotton with boles so full it looked like a field of snow. He noticed Mama, he told her later, when she spoke up for her family and demanded five cents more per hundred pounds than he’d offered. Daddy said that, if he’d not been so taken aback by her spirit, he might have waited another day or two for more workers to make their way into the area. Well, five cents tacked onto the going wage of fifteen cents a hundred pounds was safer than waiting for workers who might demand the same price but be too late to get all the cotton to the gin.

I never tired of hearing my favorite story about when Mama first met Daddy. And, no matter how many times Mama told it, she always heaved a deep sigh like an actress on a stage when she got to the part of her story when she first saw him. Mama says he confessed that he fell in love with her when he first looked into her huge doe-like eyes. He claimed it was like looking into her soul, and everything about her seemed beautiful and pure.

Beyond that serendipitous meeting, Mama and Daddy got married and began to welcome children within two years. Johnnie was born first. Though the spelling of her name was more female than male, it was perhaps based on a wish that she’d been a boy who could grow into a helper for Daddy on the farm. Sensing that unacknowledged wish, Mama dug in her heels when I was born two years later and declared I’d not have a boy’s name. She would name me after her great aunt, Helen. Wasn’t it enough to have her own name, which was Georgine, and the baby’s name, Johnnie? Why not call a girl a girl’s name for a change? So, I was named Helen. Later in life, I learned about a person whom I secretly called my other namesake—the magnificent Helen of Troy. But, when only two years after I was born, Mama gave birth to yet another girl, Daddy prevailed and named her Jo after his grandfather Joseph.

My sister Johnnie should have been a policeman. She wanted always to be in charge of me and little Jo. She’d pick the game for the day, set the rules, and go first. No way did Jo nor I argue with her ’cause she’d be sure to report some exaggerated infraction to either Mama or Daddy. And punishment was swift and sure at our house.

My sister Jo should have been a puppy. It made me feel pretty special to have her follow me around when Johnnie was out of the picture, and I treated her pretty nice. I’d push her in the tire swing and help her write her name and count the rocks we collected. I felt even more important when Johnnie finally went into first grade, and I took over her leadership role.

And me, well, everybody said I should have been a mockingbird. Mama claims I’d sing or hum under my breath all day long. There was no situation that I couldn’t make into a song, just like a mockingbird could copy the songs of many birds and never tire of singing. Well, I always thought it was better to sing and be happy than to sit and cry and be sad.

Two

It was a happy time for me and Jo at home after Johnnie started school. But those two years flew by like a flock of geese returning north, and it was now my turn to enter first grade. The yellow school bus was like a magic chariot taking me from my boring life into a world of new friends and teachers anxious to fill your head with numbers and letters and amazing stories from a shelf full of books. I immediately fell in love with my school and my teacher, Miss Luther. The only problem was that I couldn’t wait each day to get home and tell Baby Jo all about what she was missing. Our newest favorite game became playing school, and I got to be the teacher.

Even though our town was called Longmoore, there was a time when it was split in two, one side for blacks and one side for whites. On our side, Long Elementary was for grades one through five in one yellow brick building with large windows running up and down both sides. On each end of the building were double doors. One end of the building led to the bus loading area, and the other end let out onto a shady playground laid out in two squares. At recess, one square, or as I learned later, one-half of the area, was for first grade, while the second grade kept to the square that belonged to them. Then, at the next recess, third and fourth grades shared the two playground squares. Fifth grade was lucky ’cause they got to use the whole area at once, and sometimes I could hear them shouting things like: Run, run to third! or Great catch!

Miss Luther was a grey-haired and slightly-stooped old woman, but she had a soft voice and kind eyes that never missed anything going on in the whole room. The first day, she showed us all the wooden paddle she kept in her desk drawer to remind us what would happen if we caused any trouble.

I sat at a round table with three other classmates, Julia, Sally, and Charlie. I don’t know why we had to have a pesky boy at our table because he was forever making faces at us and making farting noises with his mouth to taunt Miss Luther. Julia, Sally, and I sat together in the small cafeteria at lunchtime. Instead of schoolwork, all they wanted to talk about was their dollies they were missing playing with at home. I, on the other hand, wasn’t anxious about the final bell. I was happy to be in school.

After lunch, Miss Luther had us all put our heads on our arms and close our eyes to rest. While we were resting, she read us a story about Johnny Appleseed, who had a big plan for his life. He wanted to plant apple trees everywhere he walked. I guess he missed our house, though, because we didn’t have any apple trees, just one big oak tree in the back yard. When Miss Luther read to us, it was almost as magical as if she were singing. Sometimes I softly hummed along with the words to the story.

But my favorite time of the day was when we could get the big cigar box full of crayons and a big piece of soft, creamy paper to draw something that Miss Luther would suggest to us. This time was called Art. One Friday, Miss Luther told us that we should all draw a picture of our house. I set to work with my tongue licking the side of my mouth and my mind humming Go Tell It On the Mountain, that we’d sometimes sing at Church.

I decided to pretend that I was a bird flying over our house, but the roof was missing, and I could see each and every room standing next to each other inside the brick walls. I placed the living room right at the front door. For the front door, I left my line open to let in the air from outside. The living room flowed on into the kitchen with our large wooden table and six chairs nestled up close to the window. The narrow hallway led to three bedrooms and one small bathroom. Two bedrooms stood next to each other on one side of the hallway, and the bathroom and third bedroom stood on the other side of the hallway. I left my lines open in the place where the door from the kitchen went out to the back yard and on the side of the third big bedroom where it opened onto a shady side yard and the path to the garden.

My paper was too small for me to add the garden, but I really wanted to use the colorful crayons, so I drew a bed with a green spread in the first bedroom, which was Johnnie’s room, a bed with a blue spread in the room that I shared with Jo, and a bright yellow spread for Mama’s and Daddy’s big bed. Yellow is Mama’s favorite color. I know because she told me so, saying it was because the color yellow was such a happy color. So I knew that she would be pleased to see the yellow spread I drew on her and Daddy’s bed, even though their real bedspread was just tan and boring.

As I sat up straight to admire my house, I noticed that everyone else was still coloring. Then I remembered one of the stories that Mama had told, and I drew a narrow-shaped, small house just big enough for two people to fit inside in the small back yard space and colored it brown. As I laid my crayon back in the cigar box, I raised my arms over my head and shouted, Ta-dah!

Well, Miss Luther was at my side before I could get my arms back down, and I was afraid she was going to take that paddle to me for disturbing the class. Instead, she studied my picture and said, Well, Helen, I really like your picture. Will you be the first to share it with the class?

Yes, I whispered as I got up and smoothed my skirt down and marched to just in front of Miss Luther’s desk so everyone could see me. I slowly turned from side to side as though I were a fan blowing back and forth across the room as I pointed out all the rooms and colors in our house.

As soon as I finished, I started back to my desk, but Charlie shouted out without raising his hand and being called on, What’s that little house in the yard?

Well, I answered, "that’s what’s called an outhouse, and inside there’s always a See Hers and Row Back catalog to wipe with when you’ve finished."

No applause. Only hand-muffled giggles.

At home, Mama said she really liked my house and the colorful bedspreads, and she asked me to stand in the kitchen across from her and Jo and Johnnie seated at the table and show them how I’d talked to the class. When I got to the last part when I tried to answer Charlie’s question about the catalog, Mama and Johnnie both giggled, and Jo quickly joined in, though she probably didn’t know what was funny. It was Jo who decided to clap for my performance, and Mama and Johnnie joined in so that all three of them were clapping and smiling at the same time. Suddenly, a rhyme or little song came into my head, and I sang it for them:

Our house is full of color.

Our house is full of life.

Happy happy children,

A husband and a wife.

When Mama came in to tuck me and Jo in bed that night, she explained that the catalog was from a department store called Sears and Roebuck, and finally I got to giggle like everyone else had. Silly me.

Would you like me to tell you another very short and funny story about an outhouse?

Yes, yes, yes, both Jo and I begged.

Once my Aunt Bertha and her little boy, Willie, came to visit my family in East Texas. They were a city family and lived all the way in New Mexico, so they didn’t know about things on a farm. Well, Willie asked to use the bathroom, and I directed him to our little outhouse in the backyard. Aunt Bertha and I got to visiting and had almost forgotten about Willie when all of a sudden he burst in the back door gasping for breath with tears running down his face. Mama, Mama, he cried, I’m so sorry. I know you’re gonna be mad, but I couldn’t find the flushing handle out in that bathroom anywhere!

Well, it took about a half an hour till Jo and I could get to sleep that night because one or the other of us would start thinking about poor Willie, and the giggles and then our laughter would start all over again.

Three

First and second grade roared by as fast as the freight trains that passed our house day and night. With school, chores, church, and television, our lives were full and busy. My favorite television show was American Bandstand. I didn’t like it so much for the girls and boys dancing together as I did for just the sheer joy of the music. Mama says that in her day radio had all the wonderful songs and even stories as real as today’s TV shows. The only problem was that you had to sit close to the radio and listen, then use your own imagination to fill in the pictures. She felt that she’d been lucky not to have spent all her Saturdays sitting in front of the TV watching cartoons like Johnnie, Jo, and I did. Instead, her whole family would spend the day in town, where the grownups visited, caught up on gossip, and bought groceries for the coming week. The kids went to the afternoon matinee and enjoyed such real heroes as Lash LaRue, the Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers, and Gene Autry, sandwiched between cartoons and a newsreel. All this and an all-day sucker for a dime.

It seemed that summer had hardly gotten started before it was time to go back to school. I was ready for school this time for a couple of reasons. Jo and I had been having to go with Mama to the cotton fields until lunchtime. Johnnie was babysitting for our closest neighbor’s little girl while her mother worked the morning shift at the Dairy Queen. Jo and I’d come home from the field dusty and thirsty. As soon as we washed the dirt off our hands and out of our throats, it was time to peel potatoes or set the table or bring in lettuce and tomatoes from the garden for lunch.

The second reason I was actually looking forward to the start of school this year was that I’d be entering third grade and that Jo would finally be joining Johnnie and me at school as a first-grader. I couldn’t tell if Mama was glad or sad about all three of us being gone all day when school started. She always just took things as they came and made the best of it.

I’d been telling Jo all summer about how nice Miss Luther had been to me and how to keep on her good side by doing your work on time and raising you hand for permission to go to the bathroom or to ask a question. As it turned out, Jo was assigned to the new first grade teacher, Mrs. Lucas. It didn’t take long for the word to get around that Mrs. Lucas was a white woman who’d been let go from Meadowbrook Elementary on the white side of Longmoore that was still called Moore’s Meadows because it had been founded by Mr. Sully Moore. We at Long Elementary usually called our side of town Charlie Town because Mr. Charles Long was the founder of our side of