Maya's Admiration For Mrs. Flowers

After returning to Stamps Maya meets Mrs. Flowers who is a well-educated African American woman who is everything that Maya wants to be when she grows up. Maya states, “Her skin was a rich black that would have peeled like plum if snagged, but then no one would have thought of getting close enough to Mrs. Flowers to ruffle her dress, let along snag her skin. She didn’t encourage familiarity. She wore gloves too” (Angelou 93). In other words, Maya seen for the first time in her life what is was to feel proud of whom a person was. Mrs. Flowers was not ashamed of being black; she was nothing like the other black people that she had seen in Stamps. Mrs. Flowers was educated, well-mannered but most important she was full of self-pride, nobody disrespected her and that made Maya admired her even more. Maya found a great appreciation for Mrs. Flowers that it was impossible for her to stay quiet. In fact Maya felt great admiration for Mrs. Flowers that Maya felt secured and safe around her.
As a result of that admiration for Mrs.
Flowers Maya doesn’t feel ashamed of herself any longer. Maya states, “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have done…tears of love filled my eyes at my selfishness. On that first day, I ran the hill and into the road…and had the good sense to stop running before I reached the Store” (Angelou 101). In other words, Maya realizes that all her silence has only brought more resentment towards herself. Blaming herself for the murder of Mr. Freeman was making her feel trapped in a cage, no longer is Maya feel the need to be ashamed of the color of her skin or feel guilty of Mr. Freeman’s murder. For the first time in Maya’s life she felt free to be herself, no longer did the color of her skin make her feel ashamed of
herself.
She also learns that anyone can find beauty within their self’s. Maya states, “As I ate she began the first of what we later called my lessons in living. She said that I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and even more intelligent than college professors” (Angelou 99). In other words, the higher self-esteem means that a person can begin living their life filled with more happiness and meaning. Mrs. Flowers helps Maya learn that the better a person is able to feel about themselves the more confident they become and happier with the person that they are. She also teaches her that low-self-esteem can deprive a person from accomplishing things in life. Furthermore Maya realizes that anyone can become a person of respect if they know how to carry themselves. She suggests to Maya that anyone is capable of changing the way they feel about themselves. Although Mrs. Flowers helped Maya feel that she could accomplish anything in life and that anyone is capable of learning to love themselves, Maya also understood that in order to accomplish those things she had to do them for herself and that nobody could teach her. Although it took Maya a long time that in order to accomplish things in life a person needs to feel positive about themselves, she also learns that anyone is capable of accomplishing anything they want in life. Angelou writes, “After what seemed like one thousand and on nights of challenge the mountain began to level off and we started passing scattered lights on either side of the road. No matter what happened after that, I had won” (Angelou 238). In other words, everything that Maya went through in her life was a lesson to learn, at the moment she did not understand why she was looked at differently from all the other white children but soon realized that it was because of her color of her skin. Although experiencing many negative situations she finally learned that anyone can accomplish anything on their own if they really want to. She learns that the color of a person should never deprive them of their dreams and hopes and no matter what every person is beautiful in their own unique ways. No longer did Maya want to be like those little white girls that she dreamed of being. Maya states, “Well, that may be, but the name’s too long. I’d never bother myself. I’d call her Mary if I was you. I fumed into the kitchen. That horrible woman would never have a chance to call me Mary because if I was starving I’d never work for her. I decided I wouldn’t pee on her if her heart was on fire” (Angelou 107). In other words, Maya no longer needed to feel like someone else because she was proud of herself. Maya knew that because of her color she was going to have to work harder for people to respect her like the way she would like them to. But even so she was not willing to ever let anyone step all over her and make her feel ashamed of herself. A good example is when Maya was graduating top in her class and the speaker made a comment about how a black people will never be anything in this world. After hearing the speakers negative comments Maya did not let them affect her. Maya states, “Then I wished that Gabriel Prosser and Nat Turner had killed all white folks in their beds and that Abraham Lincoln had been assassinated before the singing of Abraham Lincoln had been assassinated before the singing of the Emancipation Proclamation, and that Harriet Tubman had been killed by that blow on her head…” (Angelou 181). Maya’s point is that all people deserve a chance because those people that sometimes are looked at as unimportant are those who might make a difference in humanity. Maya urges others to let go of the past and not to dual on it because many people can accomplish many things in life but they become afraid of what others think of them. Yes everyone goes through difficult times and people point fingers at one another and blame each other for the terrible situations that happen in life to them. But if a person can learn to overcome the negative they will be surprised of the beauty that they hold within themselves.