The Legs Are the Last to Go by Diahann Carroll Page B

took me to see The Voice of the Turtle, which she assumed from the title would be a light, funny children’s show. In actuality, John Van Druten’s play was very adult, and included scenes of a black serviceman on leave employing prostitutes. Instead of pulling me out, Mother watched with me and, when it was over, told me, “Let’s not mention this to your father.” I have to laugh at this memory today because the prudish views she maintained her whole life—sex was not to be discussed ever—were always an issue for me.
    My father, meanwhile, was a man of such propriety that he even objected to the delicate amount of makeup that my mother wore to church.
    â€œIt doesn’t look respectable, Mabel,” he’d say.
    â€œOh, John, what do you know?” My mother would laugh.
    My own propriety made me a target in my young teenage years. “What is wrong with you, Johnson?” the kids in school asked. It wasn’t just my curls: it was the whole package. I didn’t smoke, wore oxfords and bobby socks (instead of heels with long socks stretched up to the knee and secured with rubber bands) and I never hung out on the street. I carried myself in the ladylike way my mother taught me, and I only associated with children she and my father deemed socially acceptable, such as Sylvia O’Gilvie, who lived nearby and came from a home (a brownstone) with two respectable parents and a car. Of course a mother like Sylvia’s had her own heightened sense of social hierarchy that was even more finely developed than my mother’s. One day when I came to visit, Sylvia’s mother told me Sylvia was out playing with her “real friends.” Somehow it became clear that that meant children whose parents were from the West Indies, not the South, and who had lighter skin and straighter hair than mine. My mother encouraged me not to be hurt, but rather to pay no attention to such unkindness.
    When Mom saw that a scholarship program was being offered through the Metropolitan Opera, she saw to it that I applied for it and enrolled at the age of ten. Each week she took me to lessons, where I learned to use my diaphragm to support my vocal cords. I learned about breathing, pulling down the tailbone, and all kinds of things about how the body works when it performs. It was overwhelming and all-consuming work, and I threw myself into it, delighted to know adultscared enough about me to want me to perform at my best level.
    Meanwhile, I prevailed as a little princess in public school. And it was enough to drive my classmates to some vicious acts of cruelty. One time, a gang of girls followed me all the way home, trying to beat me up and rip out my curls. My mother was shocked to find me arriving at our front steps out of breath and disheveled. “You girls go home now,” she called through our barred ground-floor window. “Leave us alone.” They thrust their hands through our window and tried to grab her and they didn’t leave until my mother called the police. It had never occurred to her that thirteen-year-old girls could threaten us on our own property. The next day at school, the bullying started again as we were filing up the stairs. I made it to the landing before a wave of bodies knocked me down. When the girls pulled my curls, my head hit the floor. I fought back, kicking, punching, and scratching with all my strength, and when they stopped, I was bruised and large clumps of hair had been torn out of my head. Not long after that, a guidance counselor named Mrs. Humphreys, whom I will always revere for her wisdom, recommended I apply to the High School of Music and Art. It was located nearby. But it was an entirely new world.
    I refused to go. Although I didn’t have a lot of friends at school, I didn’t want to leave behind the few I had. But my mother, like that wonderful guidance counselor, saw the opportunity. While my father had to be reassured that this