Mom & Me & Mom

Angelou is offered a role in the opera production Porgy and Bess. However, the production is going to tour Europe, and she does not want to leave her son. Vivian says it is an opportunity for her to see Europe and that Guy can stay with her. Angelou is afraid that her son might feel abandoned but explains the situation to him. Weeks later, she prepares to leave. Her son cries because he already misses her, and she feels guilty.

The production includes some of the best African American opera singers. Angelou makes friends who teach her about music; she also learns French and Spanish. She enjoys her work but is distraught being away from her son. Angelou knows “how lost a child feels when a parent is missing” (132). When she and Guy reunite, she embraces him as he sobs, promising to never leave him again.

Angelou stays in Vivian’s house with Guy when she starts experiencing anxiety. She feels it is impossible to raise her son in a racist society. During a mental health crisis, she has the impulse to take her son and jump out a window. Angelou calls a taxi and goes to a psychiatric clinic. She explains she must see a doctor because she might hurt herself or another person. When the doctor receives her, she sees he is a young white man and cries, believing he could never understand “the heart of a black woman” (133). Angelou leaves the hospital.

Angelou talks to her vocal teacher, and he suggests she write her blessings. She recognizes she is “alive and healthy” and feels better (136). She decides that despite her struggles, she will be grateful for her life.

Angelou continues to sing at a nightclub and meets poet Langston Hughes and novelist John Killens. She tells them that she is a poet and wants to pursue writing. The men suggest she go to New York. Angelou decides to move there with her son. She calls her mother to inform her, and Vivian says she is going to be a “seaman,” despite societal expectations. Angelou meets her at a hotel, and Vivian says she must be prepared for anything and do what she thinks is right. Eventually, Angelou moves to Brooklyn. She rents a house with her son and works at a Manhattan nightclub as a singer. Guy gets an afternoon job at a bakery while continuing school. Angelou starts writing songs, joins the Harlem Writers Guild, and then decides to move to Manhattan. Vivian visits and approves of her new life. One night, they head to a party in Long Island and pick up a friend in Harlem. Vivian dislikes the “drug sellers and buyers” who frequent the block (143).

Porgy and Bess will be made into a movie, and Angelou participates as a dancer. The shooting takes place in California, and she invites some of her castmates and friends to San Franscisco. She calls her mother, wanting to introduce these friends to her. The group eat dinner at Vivian’s house and stay with her. At night, Vivian asks Angelou to call a man named Cliff Thomas. She calls, and a woman swears at her. Vivian explains she had an affair with Cliff, but he lied to her and returned to his wife.

Angelou wakes to a man’s voice begging for her mother. During the night, Vivian went to Cliff’s house, holding a gun. She drove him to her house and ordered him to get on his knees. Cliff leaves, and Angelou protests Vivian’s behavior as her friends are in the house. Vivian claims that “[a] woman needs to support herself” (149). Years later, Angelou comes across Cliff at a bar in San Franscisco. He tells her that he recently visited Vivian, and “she is […] one hell of a woman” (150).

Vivian forms a group called Stockton Black Women for Humanity with friends. She also includes some of “her white sister friends,” whom she calls “honorary black women” (151). The group collects clothes for people in need. They also give scholarships to students finishing the 11th grade, who often drop out of school because they lack proper clothes.

The mayor of a town close to Stockton asks Vivian to help a white family in need. She invites them to her house the following day, cooks them breakfast, and gives them clothes; she also finds them jobs. The mayor calls Vivian to thank her, saying she wants to meet her. When the mayor, a white woman, visits Vivian, she is surprised that she is Black. Angelou notes the mayor is unable to understand that Vivian’s volunteers “[are] gathered to serve all humanity” (154). The mayor is uncomfortable and leaves, and Vivian pities her.