Anais Granofsky’s book The Girl in the Middle is released today. Here, from 2018, the Degrassi alum’s memoir for us about her very unique childhood:
y mother, Jean Walker, was the 13th of 15 children, born in 1949 to a church-going black family on a farm in Ohio. The house had only two bedrooms, so her parents slept on a pull-out bed on the porch in the summer and in the living room in winter. Her seven brothers slept in one bedroom, while the eight sisters shared the other. They attended a small school where the white kids sat up front and the black students at the back, separated by a row of empty desks.
For an ambitious immigrant family, appearances were everything, and Stanley became desperate to shed the crushing burden of his parents’ old-school expectations. In his teens, he grew a Jew-fro, wore hip-hugging corduroy bell-bottoms and smoked pot while listening to Miles Davis. Lost and desperate, he followed his best friend down to Antioch College, where he studied theatre, literature and photography. He thought that the school’s progressive culture might suit him.
In the winter of 1972, they drove to Toronto to break the news to his parents. They rolled up the driveway of my grandparents’ mansion in a beater they had borrowed from a friend. My dad wore his Che Guevara T-shirt and ripped bell-bottoms. My mother was in her best African-print wrap dress, a Black Power button proudly fastened to her ragged coat. As they pulled in, she realized her elbows were ashy and desperately dug in her fringed bag for lotion.
Around the same time, my dad began to follow a spiritual leader named Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh . The man had built a massive ashram in Pune, India, where he introduced the practice of “dynamic meditation,” a mix of Hinduism and psychotherapy that, according to Bhagwan, enabled people to experience divinity. My father decided he had to travel to India to meet this guru. In India, he took sannyas and became a disciple.
They found an apartment in San Mateo, and struggled to support themselves and a new baby. My dad was doing primal therapy while my mother worked two jobs, as a representative for AAA and a department store clerk. When I was a year old, Phil and Shirley visited my family in California. My mother served cheese and Ritz crackers as hors d’oeuvres, set the small table with their best mismatched plates and cutlery, and cooked a fancy dinner they couldn’t afford.
That night I slept in my aunt’s childhood room. She had a four-poster bed and a collection of beautiful dolls in silk dresses that closed their eyes when you laid them down. I crawled down from the bed and laid my cheek against the soft carpet lined with vacuum marks. Everything smelled so clean. The next day, my grandmother bought me new clothes that I would keep just for their place. Lace-trimmed dresses, pressed and folded. Shiny patent-leather Mary Jane shoes.
After a few years, the whipsawing between worlds had begun to take a toll. I was always trying to figure out where I belonged and what was expected of me. The tension of balancing social expectations, racism, classism and family history grew stronger over the years as I became more aware of the opportunities I had that my mother didn’t. I was old enough to understand the inequality and hostility that the people I loved felt for each other, but too young to do anything about it.
The year I turned 12, I went with my dad up to one of the communes he frequented in the Laurentians. “Make sure those crazy white people don’t touch you,” my mother warned. Fakeer pulled up in his beat-up Volvo station wagon, blaring a discourse by Bhagwan, and we were off. The commune was set up beside a sparkling blue lake. Everywhere I looked, there were hippies and sannyasins dressed in red and orange clothing. Everyone was hirsute, dirty and beautiful.
Canada Latest News, Canada Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Musk polls followers on converting Twitter HQ to homeless shelter; Bezos likes ideaTwo of the world's richest people are pitching in ideas to tackle the issue of homelessness, suggesting that Twitter Inc. convert its headquarters to a shelter home.
Read more »
Blue Jays blow 6-1 lead, lose to RangersJonah Heim had two hits and three runs batted in, including a two-run homer, as the Texas Rangers rallied past the Toronto Blue Jays 12-6 on Sunday.
Read more »
Ontario COVID-19 cases fall but hospitalizations increase to 977; 11 new deathsTORONTO - Ontario is reporting 977 people in hospital with COVID-19 today, and 173 in intensive care.
Read more »
Summerlicious to return to Toronto in AugustAfter a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Summerlicious is returning to Toronto in August.
Read more »
Toronto Raptors’ Scottie Barnes named NBA Eastern Conference rookie of the monthFor the second time this season, Toronto Raptors guard-forward Scottie Barnes has been named the NBA Eastern Conference rookie of the month.
Read more »
Police to announce arrests in two recent homicides, including shooting of Seneca College student outside Sherbourne StationPolice say that they have made arrests in two recent homicides, including the fatal shooting of a 21-year-old student from India outside a downtown Toronto subway station last week.
Read more »