Then it occurred to me that none of the books in this class, in any of my classes, in all the years of my education had ever discussed a house like mine. Not in books or magazines or film. My classmates had come from real houses, real neighborhoods, ones they could point to, but what did I know? I went home that night and realized my education had been a lie—had made presumptions about what was “normal,” what was American, what was of value. I wanted to quit school right then and there, but didn’t. Instead, I got mad, and anger when it’s used to act, when used nonviolently, has power. I asked
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