Loretta Lynn_ Coal Miner's Daughter - Loretta Lynn [20]
The next time I saw Mommy at one of my performances, I called her up on stage in front of something like 14,000 fans and said, “This is that Indian lady that told off them newspaper people.”
Then I told her, “Sure, Mommy, my report cards have all A’s on them—but you forget something. Remember how I used to help the teacher in that one-room schoolhouse? Part of my job was making out the report cards. I never told you this until just now—but I’m the one who used to give myself all them A’s.”
The audience laughed, but I don’t think Mommy saw the humor in it. She’s real touchy about her children being as good as the next family’s. And we are. She’s proud because she was one of the few mothers in Butcher Holler that chased her kids out to school every day. But you’ve got to be honest about yourself, and I’ll be the first to admit I don’t have too much education.
For a long time, I never got my driver’s license because I was scared of taking reading tests. But one public official knew I could drive a car and read all the signs and stuff, so he helped get me a license. Since Doo got me that beautiful Jaguar sports car for Christmas of 1974, sometimes I drive around the ranch, but I’m too nervous to drive in all that Nashville traffic.
I used to write out all my letters to my disc jockeys. They used to tease me about my handwriting and my words—they said I was inventing a new language of my own. I’d use words like “rememberize.” But at least they got a letter from me. I get help on all my letters now. The lady who watches my children has two years of college, and she helps me type out the postcards to the disc jockeys and the fans.
I send out about six thousand postcards from Mexico every winter. There’s not too many singers in country music who do that. My twins even lick the stamps. But I believe you’ve got to thank the fans if they take the trouble to write to you. Somebody got the idea I couldn’t read one day on my bus because he saw some of my boys opening my mail for me. That’s not because I can’t read. That’s because they screen out all the threats and the requests for money and that stuff. I read my letters from my good fans, and I try to answer ’em, too.
I write down the words to my songs, and I can read the Bible pretty well. I’ve also read some history books about my Indians to find out what the white man did. I’ve got white history books and red history books—and let me tell you, friends, they tell different stories about the same events.
I ought to be able to read a little, because Mommy made sure all us kids walked two miles down the holler to the one-room schoolhouse. There’s a big difference between holler kids and coal-camp kids. The kids in Van Lear went to a regular school with one teacher for each grade, but we only had one teacher for all eight grades. Usually, we had six or seven different teachers a year. I guess they didn’t get paid too good—or else we scared off those teachers who didn’t know how to handle us.
One time the Social Security people said you could get more benefits if you had your kids enrolled in school. All over the hollers, there was fathers sending their fifteen-year-old sons back to school. Next thing you’d know, them big boys would be whipping the teacher. And then people would have to hire ’em a new teacher.
We were used to being out-of-doors, and we’d use any excuse to get out of the schoolhouse. Like going to the outhouse. There was a boys’ out-house on one side of the school and a girls’ outhouse on the other side. Or, we’d say we needed a drink. Across the path was a spring that came down off the mountain. You’d bring your own cup and drink that water and it was delicious. One time my cousin Marie Castle and me went out for a drink and stayed a couple of hours. The teacher had to send her son to find