The teacher looked my mother over—her bra-less vest and jeans, the kente-cloth head-wrap, a pair of huge earrings shaped like Africa—and asked if the father would be joining us. The father’s at work, said my mother. Oh, said the teacher, turning to me, and what does your father do, dear, is he the reader of the house, or . . .? The father’s a postman, said my mother. The mother’s the reader. Now,
