Read One With Others: [A Little Book of Her Days] for Free Online

California, people wore purple pants.
And he did not come back and he did not come back and he did not come back. Clickety clack.
And V, lived in a box with a man who fixed clocks fixed clocks fixed clocks.
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HER OLDEST DAUGHTER, MAY, was playing at the spring across town when the word went out about the shooting at the Lorraine Motel. I best go home she told her playmate. Her mother was pacing up and down on the porch, blowing smoke. They did it she said. They killed him. The King is gone.
THE MAN IMPORTED FROM MEMPHIS, the Invader: I had only been out of prison a short time. I was making my rounds. I stopped to see some friends on Hernando Street. Stopped in L’il Ella’s. They asked what should they do if King got killed, and I said, Nothing to do but go on home.
Later, I was out walking and a woman yelled at me, Go get ’em, son. Go get ’em. I didn’t know what she was talking about. Stopped back in at L’il Ella’s and they heard it on the radio. I said, Go home, just go on home now. And the women got up with soap in their hair and left out of the shop. Next day I was sitting in the chair at home—something told me to go; my body lifted itself from the chair. I walked to Vance. I could see a silent crowd; my body carried me to Lewis & Sons where the King was laid out. Afterwards I went to the Invaders and said I was ready.
To act, just to act. That was the glorious thing.
Since I have been with the Movement, I have not committed any so-called crime. The Movement is the best thing I’ve ever been involved in.
OLDEST DAUGHTER, MAY, wanted to know: Did she tell me about her mother getting a Jheri curl.
[I have no clue what that is.]
When she crossed over, she still had to get her hair done. That was not a luxury, it was a necessity. She could not go to her old hairdresser. If she did, he would lose his shop; so she crossed over Division. Got a Jheri curl. It was a disaster. After that she wore it cropped short. She wore a Little Dutch Boy cut when beehives were big.
HER FRIEND BIRDIE: Did not see V again after she crossed over. Ever. Though she loved her. But she did not, and she could not.
Headline: WHITE WOMAN BACKS NEGROES, LOSES FRIENDS
It would be true to say, Birdie believed in V. It would be true to say, she loved her friend. And would miss her for the rest of her days.
BIRDIE: Could not confirm the long-standing rumor about the hotdog wagon.
Wildlife Federation has called off its annual picnic.
Temperatures reached mid-90s early in the day. Following a shower.
IN THE HELL’S KITCHEN APT: There were shelves crammed with votive candles and tchotchkes—most prized, a Niki de Saint Phalle powder jar with a golden serpent coiled up on its lid. Inside was a clipping of the artist’s obituary. V’s pewter crèche, her Balinese puppets.
IN HELL’S KITCHEN: She had the Harvard Classics, but she had the hots for the new stuff, same as she did the old. The Classics came from her father. Missing one volume of the English poets, though she read Swinburne at school. [She claimed the Sacred Heart library wasn’t half bad.] She also claimed to despise Browning who was her father’s favorite. On the subject of books that was her only stated instance of rebellion because she was as taken with them as was her silent, pickled old man. At the time of her death, she had made significant headway into collecting folio editions of every title she had eaten as a child.
Once, she mentioned that she was able to name the baby she gave up for adoption: Stephen.
THIS IS ONE OF THE THINGS I HEAR HAPPENED: She has just folded herself over to brush off the brown leaves covering her coleus. She has been stacking wood. She has on the work glove. She is going back inside to clean up; she bends from the waist to make a quick pass at the leaves that she might still enjoy the tart color of on her coleus a bit longer. She feels a quick sting, thinks it’s a wasp or a hornet and goes inside [the light at the sink is better]. As soon as