Up Home by Ruth J. Simmons

Author:Ruth J. Simmons [Simmons, Ruth J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2023-09-05T00:00:00+00:00

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Having worked diligently to rid myself of the country accent that was typical of those I knew from Grapeland, I didn’t want to replace it with the Black urban dialect of Houston. I decided that only the most proper English would help me shed the dust and rags of my Grapeland years. My speaking in a stilted, pretentious manner, sharply enunciating rather than eliding syllables, was shocking to some and resented by others. One of the most serious offenses one could commit was snobbishness, so I was persistently labeled “seditty” and avoided by peers for putting on airs. This shunning was less important to me than my success in creating a new persona. I suppose I thought that elocution was the best means of showing that I was smart and not limited by my family’s means or how I looked. Since the moment I discovered that I was being ridiculed for my country air, I determined to work assiduously to prove that I was worthy of respect.

My teachers at Wheatley embraced the notion that they were creating future Black leaders and drilled into us the fact that we could achieve because we were Wheatleyites. Wheatley teachers tended to be well spoken and well dressed, demonstrating to their impoverished students what respectable society would require of them. Mr. Sanders, suave and always nattily dressed, appeared bookish and engaged in delightfully witty repartee. Miss Farnsworth was also stylishly dressed; every detail of her outfits seemed perfectly chosen and fitted for her slim physique. With blond hair and fair skin, she was nevertheless unmistakably Black, but we wondered if she was of mixed race, cast aside by a wealthy white parent. Unfamiliar with any affluent Blacks, we opined that nothing else could explain her expensive wardrobe. Her elegant clothes were to play a surprising role in my life as I prepared to go off to college.

The pride of these teachers in their appearance and in how they conducted themselves reflected their enjoyment of their professional life and made me want to work even harder. That pride was the motif in all that they conveyed to us about who we were as Blacks and what we could become. Phillis Wheatley figured significantly in their urgings. Though her poetry was not taught in any class I took, teachers repeatedly reminded us that she had overcome slavery to become a published poet in the eighteenth century. Her writing style and subjects, unlike those of James Weldon Johnson and Langston Hughes, did not fit their educational purpose. They thought that the mere facts that she overcame low expectations and became a poet were the most important aspects of her story. In a glass case just inside the turquoise doors to Wheatley on Market Street there was also a display of trophies, photographs, and memorabilia representing the school’s illustrious record in sports. These efforts to instill school pride were successful in lifting our spirits and raising our sights. We could do, and possibly exceed, what others before us had done, they told us.

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