Bootlegger's Other Daughter

An Alien in My Own Country

A n A lien in M y O wn Country – i had already started high school in September of 1944 before my brother died in November. Entering Sulphur Springs High School from my little country school was like going from nurturing parents to a foster home that already had its favored children or like going fromathirdworldcountrytoamoreprosperousone.Thisexperience must account for the deep empathy I still feel for immigrants in this country.Nobodytoldmethisschoolwasgoingtobesodifferentfrom the one I had always known, and I did not know enough to ask. As I look back, I see that my expectations of how something would be and the reality of the situation were often in conflict. This contradiction did not begin or end in high school, but it seems to have been more pronounced during that time. There was a newly opened, much smaller, closer high school to the south of us—at Yantis, Texas, in Wood County—to which I could have gone. Dorothy chose to go there after that first year, and as we went our separate ways, we gradually lost contact. Freddy and the other three pupils who completed eighth grade with me also chose the nearby smaller school. I thought the larger town school was a better school and would give me more opportunities. Besides, my sister had gone there and done well, and it was the school my brother had returned to when his summer job in Houston was over. I knew the school, I thought, from listening to my sister and brother talk about it, but the school did not know me. My sister had already graduated when I got there, and the ice I imagined she would have broken for me stood in a solid block. On the first day of classes in the fall of 1944, rain fell early in the morning. Half a mile of sandy road and two miles of clay road separated my house from the highway where I was to catch the school bus for the ride to town. I walked slowly, ever so carefully, avoiding the red clay mud wherever possible. When I rounded the corner leading to the last hill that led to the highway, I saw the bus waiting for me. I knew I had to catch that bus (there were no others), so I started to run. Running in slippery clay mud is like running on ice; sooner or later, one is destined to fall. And fall I did. Mud covered my new dress, the one I had been saving since summer so I could make a good impression on the first day of school. There was mud on my legs, mud on my socks, and mud on my shoes. On the first day of school, I looked like a disaster, but I did catch the school bus. By the end of the last class on the first day of school, I could see that I was in alien territory. Most of my classmates had been in school together since first grade and had already formed tight little groups. Togethertheywenttothedrugstoreforsodasafterschool.Theywent to each others’ parties. Their parents, mostly town business people, socialized together. They went to church with the high school teachers and with each other, of course. I did not know that culture shock was the term for what I was experiencing , but I did know that being different was the kiss of death. And so, I kept trying to be one of them—to be something I was not. In particular, I passionately wanted to be invited to join the one social club for girls. Their initiation rites were spectacular. On the first day of initiation, the pledges would appear at school in strange modes of dress, leaving no doubt about who had been invited to join this club and more importantly, as far as I was concerned, who had not been invited to join. On campus grounds, always in a very conspicuous place, before and after school and at lunchtime, the pledges would gather to perform the rituals demanded by their sponsoring sisters. The rest of us stood and watched at a distance. I wondered if some of the other girls standing on the sidelines with me longed to be a part of this elite group as did I. It was something we did not talk about. Mama had let me stay home from school for a few days after J. T.’s A n A lien in M y O wn Country 145 [13.59...