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When Kaylan Faw strides up to Matson Johnstone's house and blurts, "I think yours owned my great-great-grandparents," his relationship with Johnstone is off to a rocky start. Soon after, the author, aka Matson Johnstone, shares his personal history, including what he knows about his father's maid's kin and his own. The tangled branches reveal relationships indescribably more complex than simply owner/slave entanglement.
In Johnstone's family, slaves were given to children at birth. It seems beyond imagination to understand what that would be like, but the author tries. Johnstone says, "You are not born knowing you are a slave.... Just as we all have to discover relationships, but that is all messed up when you are assigned to each other. William and Tilly taught the two from birth they were to look out for each other. That is hard for a kid to untangle."
Faw, a Ph.D. student, learned that his ancestors stayed with Johnstone's family as employees for another 150 years after slavery. The two families worked together as well as had some nefarious adventures. Faw expresses pride and awe in learning about his relatives. "My great-great-great-grandmother was a stationmaster. That is pretty cool," and, "Oh my God, oh my God, my great-grandmother knew Al Capone," he exclaims on discovering his relatives' roles in the Underground Railroad and prohibition.
When referencing one's ancestry, there is room for a wide range of emotions, such as pride, shame, humility, and regret. However, Bailey skillfully and carefully avoids expressing too many personal feelings over the past, opting instead to simply recount them. A notable book leaves one with something significant to think about. With this book, readers may be pressed to examine their own histories or rethink the stories of their families, looking from an angle other than their twenty-first-century perspectives.