Mary Alice Monroe - Sweetgrass

Though she would never admit this to Maize, since it would be like pouring kerosene on an open fire, Nona had felt a stiffening of the spine when Mary June hinted at her coming back to work. She didn’t know why, exactly. She was fond of Mary June, and working at Sweetgrass was just the way things had always been for her. She’d grown up into the job and was proud of the quality of her work.

Nona recollected how Preston’s mother, old Margaret Blakely, could make a statement sound cool and polite, but it was always understood that she was giving an order. Nona, the shutters in the front room need dusting today. It wasn’t the order that rankled. After all, Mrs. Blakely was her employer. It was the way she said it, without a smile or without even looking her in the eye that had made Nona feel less about her work. Adele had been like her mother, even as a young girl.

Mary June Clark, though, was different. She was born to land, too, but never took on the airs. Courtesy for her was the same as kindness. She’d always asked Nona’s opinions about what did and did not need doing, and she listened. The respect made the difference between them.

“You calm yourself down,” Nona said to her daughter. “Mary June just found herself in a bind, is all. It’s a shame about Preston Blakely. That poor family! Haven’t they seen enough trouble? I don’t know what they’ll do now.”

“It’s no trouble for us.”

Nona drew herself back. “Why, the Blakelys have been my friends for as long as I’ve been alive.”

“You’re not their friend, Mama,” Maize said, giving her the narrowed eye. “You’ve got to get that into your head.”

“Every Christmas, don’t they send us a side of pork or beef from their livestock? And don’t we have leave to take whatever we want from their land? Your daddy likes to hunt and gather wood, sure, but you tell me where I’d be without collecting the sweetgrass from my sacred spot. And whenever any one of us took sick, it was Mary June who came calling with food. If that’s not a friend, I don’t know what is.”

“It’s what they do. It’s called noblesse oblige, Mama, not friendship. Rich white folks aren’t friends with poor black folks like us.”

“What do you know about any of that?” Nona asked, feeling her cheeks burn at being scolded by her own daughter. “You never worked in that house alongside them, you don’t know about my relationship with Mary June. Or with Preston Blakely, either. Lots of things happen over seventy years, I can tell you.”

“Answer me this. When was the last time she stopped by your basket stand to ask you to dinner? Or even out to a movie? That’s what you do with a friend, Mama. Not ask them to come back to work for you.”

Nona knew the difference between that kind of friendship and the friendship she shared with Mary June. “There are different kinds of friends at different levels. Don’t I hear you calling those people you work with at that bank your friends? My friend this. My friend that. Yet, I never saw you go out to a movie with them, neither.”

Maize’s face pinched but she looked away.

“You think you know everything just because you got that college degree. Well, there’s a lot to know about people and life that you can’t learn in books.”

“It’s not just about the college degree, Mama. It’s about getting educated, pursuing a career, competing in today’s world. It’s about being a player. That’s the reality I want for my children. Not cleaning up some white folks’ house, doing what they say, what they want, when they want it. This family’s been in bondage long enough!”

Nona drew herself up to her full height, one hand steadying herself on the counter, the other clenching her hip. She glared at Maize, this child of her own womb who she loved with a mother’s fierce pride, yet her eyes were dark with rage and she could feel herself trembling with the hurt and fury she was struggling to keep compressed inside.

“Just who do you think you’re calling a slave, child?” Nona’s voice was low and trembled with emotion. Maize’s self-righteous expression faltered. From across the room, Nona’s two grandchildren had stopped watching the television and were watching them with ashen faces and wide eyes. Nona’s lip trembled at the shame of it, but she fought for control. When she could speak again, she said, “I’m sorry that you’re so ashamed of your mother.”

“Mama…”

She pushed Maize’s arm away, sparing her dignity. “I’m proud of my work. It was good and honest and I was skilled at it. And it was my work that put you through your fancy schooling, young lady. Gracie!” she called out, turning to her granddaughter. The nine-year-old girl startled. “Go get me the family Bible.”

Grace scrambled to her feet and retrieved a large, faded and worn black leather-bound Bible that rested in a place of honor on the bookshelf. She carried it to her grandmother with both hands as though she were in a church procession.

“Thank you, child. You’re a good girl. Now, take a seat here at the table. You, too, Kwame,” she called to her thirteen-year-old grandson. He groaned softly, dragging his feet to the table. “You’re becoming a man and need to hear this most. This is your heritage.”

“Mama, not again,” said Maize, crossing her arms and leaning against the counter in passive protest. “They’ve heard this story a hundred times or more.”

“And they’re going to hear it one more time. These children can’t hear it enough. And to my mind, you still haven’t got the message in your head. Time was, the only way a family could pass on records was through the telling of them. But our family is one of the lucky ones. We’ve got the names written down. Right in here,” she said reverently, passing her strong hand over the fragile, crackled leather.

“I might not recollect all the names,” Nona continued, “but seven generations of our ancestors labored at Sweetgrass, and not all of them as slaves. After emancipation, we were free to choose to leave or stay. Most left. But your great-something-grandmother chose to stay on as hired labor. They worked hard and saved smart and bought themselves a good piece of land from the Blakelys for fifty cents an acre. That’s the land that we, and the other heirs, are living on even to this day. This land is where our roots are. This is our history.” Her voice trembled with emotion.

Nona felt her family’s ancestors gathering close about her as she grew old, closer now even than some of the living. Sometimes at night, especially when the moon was soft, the air close and a mist rolled in from the sea, she couldn’t sleep for feeling them floating around her, comforting her, calling to her from across the divide.

She slowly sat in the kitchen chair and set the Bible on the wood table. The chair’s worn blue floral cushion did little to ease her pains, but she gave them no mind as she opened up the Bible to reveal yellowed sheets of paper as thin as a moth’s wing. Each page was crowded with faded black ink in an elaborate script. She was proud of the fine handwriting of her kin. She often marveled at their courage to practice the skill, given the life-and-death orders against slaves reading and writing.

“Most of what I know about our distant kin was passed on orally in stories. I recollect just bits, mostly about a slave named Mathilde who came from Africa. And Ben, who escaped north never to be heard from again. You remember those stories?”

When the children nodded, she rewarded them with an approving smile. Maize hovered closer, joining the circle.

“Now, my great-grandmother was Delilah. That’s her name right there. She was the last of our family enslaved at Sweetgrass, and it was Delilah who first began to write down our family history. She was the head housekeeper at Sweetgrass and a fine, intelligent woman. Taught herself how to read and write from the children’s schoolbooks. Had to sneak them, of course, at great peril. It was only after the War Act that she felt safe to write openly. Must’ve been a fine day when Delilah wrote her first entry in this Bible. Look close!”