(Reffering to cissy`s mother)
"If she was angry, you didn’t know it," remembered
my sister, Anne. "And I know there were times that she
should have been angry …" You never heard her yelling
at us. She would punish us or spank us - but even then that was
not in a loud, boisterous way. The disciplining she left to my
father."
(P 76)
"We used to play church a lot," Anne laughs.
All we knew was church,
so that was our pastime. But if my father caught us, it was on."
(P 77)
My father heard the commotion, came in the room and
figured out what
happened. "I told you about playing church," he said.
And then we got
it."
(P 100)
But I did sneak into the Green Lantern. Oooh, I could
dance and I
played all the records I could and ate potato chips in that place
until Reebie caught up with me. I got a good beating for being in
that
place. But I never fought her. … it was unthinkable to raise
a hand to
my sister…"
(P 101)
… I was really happy to be back at my father’s
house, even though it
took a beating to get me there.
(P 169)
(Cissy speaking of her own children)
Gary flinched at my threat. But he made no move toward the other
boy.
"You don’t believe me!" I howled. I grabbed him by
the arm, spun him
around and started whacking his butt with my free hand.
I made John the gentle, more lenient parent. I tended to
be the
disciplinarian, so I told him to be the softie. He looked
confused and
couldn’t understand why I was doing this. "They need
someone to go to
after I whip their butts. Let’em run to you."
(P 45)