At about 11:15, [Mr. Taylor] returns. Tyrec gets up, goes into kitchen where parents are. Mr. Taylor grabs his son and hugs him from behind, rocks him back and forth for about thirty seconds, says: “Are you watching that foolishness?” Tyrec: “It’s not foolishness!” Mr. Taylor: “Yes, it is. You gettin’ indoctrinated in there.”
We observed this kind of aggressive edge to displays of affection between Black and white working-class fathers and sons.
Tyrec’s parents, in another effort to save their marriage,3 recently have started to “date.” Although each separately wants the marriage to work, when they are together, they clash frequently. Routine aspects of family life are often hotly contested. One Sunday, after a Vacation Bible School program, the two square off briefly:
Ms. Taylor says, “Tyrec, ask Dad if he is going to take us out for lunch at McDonald’s after the closing program.” Mr. Taylor says (quietly, but angrily, looking her in the eye), “Don’t set me up.” Ms. Taylor stares at him (standing, looking down) and he repeats, “Don’t set me up by telling them that.” She doesn’t say anything but walks off to the kitchen.
Mr. Taylor takes the family to Burger King, which is near his apartment. This choice prompts dissension, particularly from Ms. Taylor. She would have preferred going to eat in Millville, a shopping center located in a predominantly white area but frequented by a variety of racial groups:
[Ms. Taylor] says, “He had to come in the ghetto . . . [They have] dried up French fries . . . “ [Mr. Taylor] says, “I don’t like to go there. I am comfortable here; I like it here.” [Ms. Taylor] again (speaking to the field-worker, who had driven in a separate car), “We wanted to go to Millville, but he wanted to come here.”
This kind of verbal sparring and open conflict characterizes Mr. and Ms. Taylor’s relationship. Although sometimes there are friendly exchanges as well as comfortable silences, laughter is rare and tension is common.
ORGANIZATION OF DAILY LIFE: FREE-FLOWING TIME
Working-class and poor families organize their time differently from middle-class families. Children’s organized activities do not set the pace of life. Unlike the Tallingers, who consider a weekend quiet if they have only one or two events to go to, the Taylors are busy if they have one major event scheduled. Planned events of any kind are unusual for the Taylors, and the calendar is not the heart of the household. Children’s out-of-school time is relatively unstructured and, unlike for Garrett Tallinger, separate from adults’ worlds. When Tyrec and Anisha were young, Ms. Taylor’s grandmother would come to the house and watch them until Ms. Taylor got home from work. Now they are allowed to stay at home together without an adult. They generally are free to set their own schedules and choose their own activities.
Sometimes, Tyrec simply hangs out at home. One July afternoon, for example, after he returns from day camp, he, his friend Clayton, and I pass the time lying around companionably on the living room floor.
Tyrec is on the floor on his back, watching cartoons (I am lying near Tyrec) . . . Clayton is on the couch, sprawled out; he is trying to convince Tyrec to go swimming [in the public pool, a few blocks away]. As he talks, Clayton is arching his fingers forward and back in sequence. He looks languid. They are talking in low voices. Clayton can’t hear what Tyrec is saying. He slowly slides off the couch so that now he lies on his back on the floor in the small space between the couch and the coffee table. All three of us are lying on the floor with parts of our bodies jutting under the coffee table. (It all seems perfectly normal; no one makes jokes about it. We are just there.)
The amount of time allotted to any given activity varies. Television and video games are a major source of entertainment, but outdoor play can trump either of these. No advanced planning, no telephone calls, no consultations between mothers, no drop-offs or pickups—no particular effort at all—is required to launch an activity. For instance, one afternoon, Anisha and Tyrec walk out their front door to the curb of the small, narrow street their house faces. Anisha begins playing a game with a ball; she soon has company:
(Two boys from the neighborhood walk up.) Anisha is throwing the small ball against the side of the row house. Tyrec joins in the game with her. As they throw the ball against the wall, they say things they must do with the ball. It went something like this: Johnny Crow wanted to know. . . . (bounces ball against the wall), touch your knee (bounce), touch your toe (bounce), touch the ground (bounce), under the knee (bounce), turn around (bounce). Anisha and Tyrec played about four rounds.
Unexpected events produce hilarity:
At one point Anisha accidentally threw the ball and it bounced off of Tyrec’s head. All the kids laughed; then Tyrec, who had the ball, went chasing after Anisha. It was a close, fun moment—lots of laughter, eye contact, giggling, chasing.
Soon a different game evolves. Tyrec is on restriction. He is supposed to remain inside the house all day. So, when he thinks he has caught a glimpse of his mom returning home from work, he dashes inside. He reappears as soon as he realizes that it was a false alarm. The neighborhood children begin an informal game of baiting him:
The kids keep teasing Tyrec that his mom’s coming—which sends him scurrying just inside the door, peering out of the screen door. This game is enacted about six times. Tyrec also chases Anisha around the street, trying to get the ball from her. A few times Anisha tells Tyrec that he’d better “get inside”; he ignores her. Then, at 6:50 [P.M.] Ken (a friend of Tyrec’s) says, “There’s your mom!” Tyrec scoots inside, then says, “Oh, man. You were serious this time.”
Informal, impromptu outdoor play is common in Tyrec’s neighborhood. A group of boys approximately his age, regularly numbering four or five but sometimes reaching as many as ten, play ball games together on the street, walk to the store to get treats, watch television at each other’s homes, and generally hang out together.4 One afternoon, the boys stand around on the street next to a parked car. Heads close together, Tyrec and his friends pursue interesting conversations:
The first topic is about weird finger tricks. Shawn tells a story about a girl who could bend her middle finger back to the back of her hand, then lock her pinky finger behind the middle finger . . . Somehow the conversation turns to health and babies. Ken tells the boys that “what you eat, what you feed them, is how they turn out. So, you want your babies healthy, you should feed them healthy.” Tyrec: “I’ll feed mine pizza.” (laughter) Ken: “Nah, I’ll feed mine healthy stuff like fruit . . . Shawn: “Carrots?” Ken says loudly, “No, FRUIT.” Ken continues, “Even when your wife is pregnant, you got to feed her healthy.” . . . Then they move on to talk about how health is related to sports . . . Next, they talk about how someone’s sister is dating someone else . . . Soon after this exchange, Ken decides that he’s going to the store. Shawn says he’ll come. Shawn asks Tyrec if he is coming, too. Tyrec says that he needs to ask his mom first. He goes in; I follow.
Gender also played an important role in shaping Tyrec’s activities with his friends. Compared to the girls in the study, he was more physically active and was given more latitude in the distance he could travel from home as well as how late he could be out with his friends. In addition, many of their activities had traditional masculine elements, showing speed, prowess, athletic ability, physical strength and courage. Sometimes they tested each other to see how hard and how far they could throw things and took turns trying to break something. Pretending to fight, chasing and threatening to fight, and actually fighting were common activities.