In a respite from the more serious themes of the autobiography, Angelou's reminiscences about early adolescence, when forging friendships, receiving love notes, exchanging valentines, sizing up a male admirer, and completing eighth grade take precedence over her concern for equality and self-determination for the black race. A cameo of Americana at the end of the 1930s, Angelou's picture of women frying fish and arranging barbecued chickens and spareribs, baked ham, and homemade pickles and cakes on picnic tables, children playing ring games, Bailey and Maya lugging watermelons into the Coca-Cola box and filling an iron washpot with ice, and gospel singers warming up for a performance supplies the African-American counterpart of a Norman Rockwell print or an oil painting of a neighborhood outing by Grandma Moses. Freed from the devastating emotional turmoil of earlier chapters, Maya, while guarding the gnawing secret of rape by Mr. Freeman, finds time to gaze at clouds and share intimate girl talk with her contemporary, Louise Kendricks.
No less evocative of Southern culture of the early 1940s, Maya's eighth-grade graduation from the no-frills Lafayette County Training School, recounted in nostalgic, bittersweet glimpses, highlights a processional through "a few shady tall persimmon trees," gifts of money, handkerchiefs, a book of Edgar Allan Poe's works, a new dress, and a Mickey Mouse watch from friends and relatives, a breakfast worthy of Sunday morning, and, for a few fellow students, ready-made outfits from Sears and Roebuck or Montgomery Ward or makeovers of hand-me-downs for those who cannot afford new clothes. The second singing of the black national anthem, a traditional rallying song since its publication in 1900, negates the denigrating oration of the supercilious Mr. Edward Donleavy and revives Maya from a temporary letdown. For the first time, she internalizes the familiar words and realizes that "Black known and unknown poets" (including "preachers, musicians and blues singers") have had a significant role in uplifting African-Americans.
