Clever, but schoolteacher beat him anyway to show him that definitions belonged to the definers — not the defined. - Toni Morrison

Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.

Even if the room they rented was smaller than the heifer’s stall and darker than a morning privy, they stayed to look at their number, hear themselves in an audience, feel themselves moving down the street among hundreds of others who moved the way they did, and who, when they spoke, regardless of the accent, treated language like the same intricate, malleable toy designed for their play.

Nothing like other folks' sin for distraction.