For A Few Dollars More

One of the unsettling aspects of being physically abused by your mother is that it sets you up to be abused by others later in life. Since you have never known anything else, it takes a while to learn that love is not a four letter word and that that all your interactions with others do not have to come with pain and anguish. It took me a long time to learn that my self-worth was not contingent on whether someone cared for me or not. It took me years to learn to stand up for myself, even when it was apparent I was getting the short end of the stick.

Many people saw how broken I was and took advantage of my low opinion of myself. I did not need as much as others, could work longer and harder for less pay, and virtually be forgotten by those who I so much wanted to love and care for me.

Many years ago when I was a starving college student, I was on my way back to my dorm after working some little thankless job that barely put change in my pocket. I was ill prepared for college life. I had never been anywhere, done anything, or been around girls that had trunks full of clothes and personal property that they could actually cart off to another place. I was an oddity and not just because I was black. I arrived with a half filled suitcase that I knew I would have to fill on my own. I did not go to college for any great love of learning or knowledge. I went to get out of the house before my mother killed me. The summer I graduated high school her rage was great. We both knew that it would be better for me if I was not there.

I used to always walk with my head down, and on this particular day it was fortuitous for me because lying right in front of me was a wad of recently lost cash. Just as I bent to pick it up I head a voice demand that I hand it over. Staring at me was the much, much older boyfriend of one of the Resident Assistants of my dorm. In her I saw some of myself. She was very unattractive and mousy and no doubt very grateful for the attentions of this man. I had the money in my hand and I was reluctant to turn it over. It was, after all, mine. I had found it! I could very well use it to buy cigarettes, soda, snacks. He again demanded the money, telling her to tell me that I had to give it to him.

As much as I felt she didn't want to, she turned to me and said, "You better give it to him." I slowly handed him the salvation that I had briefly held. There would be no late night snacks. No feeling that I had something to rely on. I often think about that incident; how boldly this man stole from a girl who so needed it. I do believe that in the righteous order of the universe, he got more than he bargained for.

I believe that I think about this because now, I would and could know what to do. No one could make me give up anything! Or take from me what was rightly mine. We know better now and that feels good.