I began to look for activities away from home. I sang all over the neighborhood for civic organizations, ladies’ groups, luncheon clubs, Kiwanis meetings, and even schools. The bonus was that some of them paid me, and I enjoyed my independence.
In the same way, I began to enjoy school. I decided to interact with the teacher and other children. Maybe I would have fun if I entered into the day-to-day business of the classroom instead of constantly retreating into my world with Granddaddy Saul and the cane.
But I thought about my Great-Grandmama Laura Mae almost every day. I also thought about my aunts and uncles and cousins, and especially about my Aunt Emma. Mama said she was sick. She and Great-Grandmama Laura Mae would be along later. I didn’t ever think about my daddy. I didn’t miss him. Mama told me he was trying to find us, and if he did, we’d have to move again. I hoped he’d never find us.
MY COUSINS BELONGED TO THE MT. CARMEL BAPTIST Church on Oak Street, and we soon became regular members there too. In the early days, I met two of the most important musical influences in my young life there: Mrs. Jonathan Butler and Reverend Obadiah Rhodes. Mrs. Butler was the superintendent of the Sunday school and sang alto in the regular church choir. She loved my baby voice and encouraged me to sing from a tender age. She coached me on the hymns and spirituals and would sing them with me often. At home, Mama would encourage our singing for the Lord, and we would all join in. Poor Willie Jr. couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket with a lid on it! But he loved singing as much as I did, and nobody had the heart to tell him he couldn’t stay on key.
My family was a traditional Baptist, God-fearing one. And even before I truly understood what homosexuality meant, it was drilled into my brain that those men were wrong in the eyes of God.
One Saturday morning, my mother told us to wash up and dress in our Sunday best. My cousin Johnny Mae was getting married at Mt. Carmel. I’d never been to a wedding before. Everyone was excited, and the music was great. We sang along, and I enjoyed the steady parade of familiar faces marching down the center aisle to their seats, everyone dressed up in their finest outfits. Even people who didn’t go to our church were there.
When I saw Johnny Mae coming down that aisle all dressed in white, my heart nearly stopped! I thought she was the most beautiful woman in the whole world. Even though I was only five years old, I knew that one day I would wear one of those dresses and look just as beautiful as my cousin. Later, when I told my mother my idea, she slapped me on the behind and told me not to be silly. “Boys don’t wear wedding gowns,” she said, and rolled her eyes at me. I tried not to show how disappointed I was and kept asking if I could be an exception. But she emphatically refused. She and the church found my deepest desires to be unacceptable.
Still, I found solace in the church. As I got older, I took on more and more responsibilities. I eventually became the choir director. By the time I was twelve, I had learned to read music at the Christ Mission after-school program. Rev. Obadiah Rhodes, our pastor, loved my singing. I seemed to have a gift for pleasing him and most of the ladies of the church. When I sang a solo, which was often, women and men alike would shout and throw canes, fans, hats, and purses around. People attributed all kinds of spiritual anointments and God-given gifts to my ability to deliver a song. I was singing for the Lord!
Knowing that “the hand of the Lord was upon” me made all the difference in the world to me. This knowledge gave me a power of concentration and single-mindedness that has stayed with me all my life.
THROUGHOUT GRADE SCHOOL, I WAS ENCOURAGED BY my teachers and given lots of extra attention. I gained confidence musically, and my grades were pretty high. I not only got along with the other students, but also at some point I realized that I was, indeed, popular and a teacher’s pet. It seemed they doted on the one that needed the most help and encouragement. I was teased a lot for that.
I recognized that some of the kids were jealous of my special status, so I always downplayed it. I even downplayed it with my siblings. I continued to work hard, but I stopped telling my friends how I did on exams, and I never showed off a high mark on returned papers. I sang as best I could, and I studied often. I became adept at avoiding any confrontations.
From grade to grade, I grew in confidence and performance. I never let myself say that I was special, but I knew that I was. If I had been a weaker person, my stepfather’s growing anger would have turned me around, but the more he drank and the meaner he was, the stronger I became.
My mother seemed to ignore all of it, as though it wasn’t happening. The first time he reached out and struck me, everything stopped. He said I had a “smart mouth.” I said I was just telling him the truth. The second time, he knocked me down. It only took me a second for me to realize that telling the truth was dangerous. My mother always sided with Warren and further solidified his superior status in our home. It goes without saying that things were never the same again between us after that.
Warren’s continued cruelty was a major factor in my decision to spend as much time away from home as possible. Nobody seemed to notice that I was staying after school with the choir director more and more. I learned every song from memory that my junior high music teacher would give me, and I started playing the clarinet. I started behaving one way at home and completely differently in school. I was so outgoing in school, it was maddening. At home, I fell into such a silence that often nobody knew I was around. I hid behind books: classics, poetry, romantic Western novels, Rin Tin Tin, other dog stories, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The local librarian became my best friend. Often, she suggested new books that I should read.
All of this was superseded by my study of the Bible. I quietly searched for some saving force that could take my stepfather out of my life. I leaned heavily on the Old Testament and the fire-and-brimstone God who had rescued Israel from Egypt. People saw me reading the Bible all the time, but seldom did they ask me specifically what I was reading. I struggled with the knowledge that I had grown to hate my stepfather, but I figured God would forgive me because I had given my heart and my talent to singing sacred Christian songs in praise of Jehovah and Jesus Christ. Nobody was perfect.
Even though I carried a copy of the Bible small enough to fit into my book bag, I wasn’t thinking about the Bible all the time. Sometimes I would surprise myself when I realized I was thinking about boys. Nobody ever mentioned anything about being gay or straight, but I did hear sermons from time to time that laid out, in detail, what the preacher would call an abomination in Sodom and Gomorrah—men sleeping with men.
I wondered over and over if this warm feeling in the pit of my stomach for one of my buddies was sinful. I dared to bring the subject up several times with a couple of my friends, who quickly told me to put it out of my mind. It was not a subject that was supposed to be discussed, even among friends. Well then, whom was I supposed to discuss it with? I already knew that I could not divulge this secret to my brother and sisters. So, I prayed and kept this warmth to myself.
I DIDN’T NEED A HIGH IQ TO NOTICE THAT MOST OF THE students in my class at Hayes Junior High School were white or Jewish even though the school was supposed to be integrated. Of the 1,300 or so students, ethnic groups were all about evenly divided: one-third white, one-third Jewish, and one-third black. I later learned that the school system utilized a track system, which was based partially on race and family economics. All the students in my class were white. All thirty-three, except for me. I was in the second track most of the time. Sometimes I was in the first track. In my view, it was unfair, and I often wondered how the officials in the public school system could justify their decision to segregate most of the black students.
This kind of subtle, systematic racism continued through junior high school and into high school. Because of my love of music, I continued to play in the band and sing in the choir.