HotmailMaya Angelou: ‘Letter to My Daughter’
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Chapter four: Giving birth
My brother Bailey told me to keep my pregnancy a secret from my mother. He said she would take me out of school. I was very close to graduating. Bailey said I had to have a high school diploma before mother returned to San Francisco from the nightclub she and her husband owned in Nome, Alaska.
I received my diploma on VJ day which was also my step-father’s birthday. He had patted me on the shoulder that morning and said, “You are growing up and you are becoming a fine young woman.” I thought to myself I should, I am eight months and one week pregnant.
After a salutary dinner celebrating his birthday, my graduation, and a national victory, I left a note on his pillow saying, “Dad, I am sorry to bring disgrace to the family, but I have to tell you that I am pregnant.” I didn’t sleep that night.
I heard my dad go to his room about 3:00 a.m. When he didn’t knock on my door immediately, I puzzled over whether he had seen and read the note. There would be no sleep for me that night.
At 8:30 in the morning he spoke at my door. He said, “Baby, come down and have coffee with me, by the way — I got your note.”
The sound of him walking away was not nearly as loud as the sound of my heart racing. Downstairs at the table he said, “I’m going to call your mother. How far along are you?”
I said, “I have three weeks.”
He smiled. “I’m sure your mother will be here today.”
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Before nightfall my pretty little mother walked into the house. She gave me a kiss then looked at me. “You’re more than any three weeks pregnant.”
I said, “No ma’am, I’m eight months and one week pregnant.”
She asked, “Who is the boy?” I told her.
She asked, “Do you love him?”
I said, “No.”
“Does he love you?”
I said, “No, he’s the only person with whom I had sex and we were together only one time.”
My mother said, “There is no reason to ruin three lives; our family is going to have a wonderful baby.”
She was a registered nurse so when I began labor she shaved me, powdered me and took me to the hospital. The doctor had not arrived. Mother introduced herself to the nurses and said as a nurse herself, she was going to help with the delivery.
She crawled up on the delivery table with me and had me bend my legs. She put her shoulder against my knee and told me dirty stories. When the pains came she told me the punch line of the stories and as I laughed, she told me, “Bear down.”
When the baby started coming, my little mother jumped off the table and seeing him emerge, she shouted, “Here he comes and he has black hair.” I wondered what color she thought he might have.
When the baby was delivered, my mother caught him. She and the other nurses cleaned him, wrapped him in a blanket and she brought him to me. “Here my baby, here’s your beautiful baby.”
My dad said when she returned home, she was so tired, she looked as if she had given birth to quintuplets.
She was so proud of her grandson and proud of me. I never had to spend one minute regretting giving birth to a child who had a devoted family led by a fearless, doting, and glorious grandmother. So I became proud of myself.
Excerpted from “Letter to My Daughter” by Maya Angelou. Copyright © 2008 by Maya Angelou. Excerpted by permission of Random House Group, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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