My father prevailed on some friends to clothe and house us temporarily

　　My father prevailed on some friends to clothe and house us temporarily; then he moved us intoanother house on the outskirts of East Lansing. In those days Negroes weren't allowed after dark inEast Lansing proper. There's where Michigan State University is located; I related all of this to anaudience of students when I spoke there in January, 1963 (and had the first reunion in a long whilewith my younger brother, Robert, who was there doing postgraduate studies in psychology). I toldthem how East Lansing harassed us so much that we had to move again, this time two miles out oftown, into the country. This was where my father built for us with his own hands a four-room house.
　　This is where I really begin to remember things-this home where I started to grow up.
　　After the fire, I remember that my father was called in and questioned about a permit for the pistolwith which he had shot at the white men who set the fire. I remember that the police were alwaysdropping by our house, shoving things around, "just checking" or "looking for a gun." The pistol theywere looking for-which they never found, and for which they wouldn't issue a permit-was sewed upinside a pillow. My father's .22 rifle and his shotgun, though, were right out in the open; everyone hadthem for hunting birds and rabbits and other game.
　　 After that, my memories are of the friction between my father and mother. They seemed to be nearlyalways at odds. Sometimes my father would beat her. It might have had something to do with the factthat my mother had a pretty good education. Where she got it I don't know. But an educated woman, Isuppose, can't resist the temptation to correct an uneducated man. Every now and then, when she putthose smooth words on him, he would grab her.
　　My father was also belligerent toward all of the children, except me. The older ones he would beatalmost savagely if they broke any of his rules-and he had so many rules it was hard to know them all.
　　Nearly all my whippings came from my mother. I've thought a lot about why. I actually believe that asanti-white as my father was, he was subconsciously so afflicted with the white man's brainwashing of Negroes that he inclined to favor the light ones, and I was his lightest child. Most Negro parents inthose days would almost instinctively treat any lighter children better than they did the darker ones. Itcame directly from the slavery tradition that the "mulatto," because he was visibly nearer to white, wastherefore "better."My two other images of my father are both outside the home. One was his role as a Baptist preacher.
　　He never pastored in any regular church of his own; he was always a "visiting preacher." I rememberespecially his favorite sermon: "That little _black_ train is a-comin' . . . an' you better get all yourbusiness right!" I guess this also fit his association with the back-to-Africa movement, with MarcusGarvey's "Black Train Homeward." My brother Philbert, the one just older than me, loved church, butit confused and amazed me. I would sit goggle-eyed at my father jumping and shouting as hepreached, with the congregation jumping and shouting behind him, their souls and bodies devoted tosinging and praying. Even at that young age, I just couldn't believe in the Christian concept of Jesus assomeone divine. And no religious person, until I was a man in my twenties-and then in prison-couldtell me anything. I had very little respect for most people who represented religion.