Als’ essay gives a look into what his life was like growing up, constantly moving,  and trying to navigate the world. When he recalls the Brownsville uprising, he states, “Standing by my mother’s living-room window, I tried, tentatively, to ask her why our world was burning, burning. She gave me a forbidding look: Boy, be quiet so you can survive, her eyes seemed to say.” His mother silences Als because of the danger that speaking up means. Als mother fought for civil rights when she participated in Martin Luther King’s march on Washington in 1963, but while fighting, she also acknowledges the fine line that they must walk in order to survive in this world. This points to the hypocrisy of our society where we claim everyone has the freedom of speech, without acknowledging that some people live everyday suppressing their voice in exchange for survival. 

When Als says “Like any number of black boys in those neighborhoods, I grew up in a matrilineal society, where I had been taught the power—the necessity—of silence,” it further points to the fact that the suppression of their voice is not a unique case, but rather, a commonality for black people to survive in this world. Growing up seeing his own mother silencing him in the name of survival, it contributes to his later questioning of whether or not to forgive when he gets trampled on by white people. 

Another section that stood out to me was when the author writes, “It wasn’t that your mother didn’t care—you were all she had—it was just that she kept running out of time. In addition to her full-time job—and, often, a second job—there was the work that went into feeding you, listening to you, and making sure no one laughed at you or cracked you in the face because you had dreams.” He points out another struggle that his family and his community faced: mothers working long hours just to support their children. In the matrilineal society that Als grew up in, women had to not only support their family financially, but also defend their children from a world that does not afford black kids the same opportunities and ease as white kids.