" . . . and another thang . . ."

"Grandpa, if some men want to be women do they want to  have babies, too?"
"Now, son, some  things is better not to talk about."
"Why not, grandpa?"
" 'Cause  I don' care how much they cut on a man they ain' gon' make him no woman."
"But I hear people talking about it on TV and on the radio --"
"We ain't the same physically and we don't think alike -- that's why we have to make these exceptions for women . . ."
"Is it true that we ain't suppose to hit a woman?"

"You ain' 'pose to hit a woman no matter what she do."
"What if she's trying to kill you?"
"You have to be done done something awful against her for her to try to kill you."
"I seen a woman standing on her tiptoes, looking in a man's face and cussing him . . ."
"Even then he can jus' walk away."
"If a girl do that to me, I'll slap her."
"How old are you, son?"
"Thirteen."

"As you get older, you'll change . . . things is always changing . . . when I was about  your age we didn't have all these machines and gadgets taking over society.  Now days people spend all day sitting at a computer, can't walk down the street or get they bus fare out'a their pocket or purse 'cause they can't stop gossiping on some cell -- and another thang -- I remember when I was about your age, me and some buddies had jus' come from seeing this movie with James Cagney  fighting these Japanese and we wanted to join the Army and fight 'em too, but we  knew we was too young, and we thought maybe they'd accept us as water-boys and we could go out on the battlefield -- during a break in the fighting -- and take the soldiers some water, as if fighting a war was like playing football.

"We was all raised to be very patriotic in those days.  We had a little school we went to, only two rooms, but every morning before classes started we used to stand  up, put our  hand over our heart and proudly pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America . . . now, we got scum, Americans, who spit on the flag and step on it and burn it and make me so mad I wanna stomp on 'em till they can't walk . . . ."