In the book Coffee Will Make You Black, by April Sinclair, the main character of the book is a young girl named Jean Stevenson also known as “Stevie” who faces many growing up issues. She is African American girl who has two younger brothers and lives with her parents. As she goes to grade schools she is faced with peer pressure from friends to act a certain way. Stevie is a confused teenager who wants to find who she really is. The main issue that I will be focusing on is on Stevie’s experience with sexual awakening and the discovery of same sex attraction.
Growing up with a mother who is conservative and doesn’t show much emotion, Stevie is left to with many unanswered questions. She is curios when she is asked to about getting her period, as well as friends talking about their love coming down ,yet the mother refuses to answer any questions and tell her that she needs to stay away from it all. This causes Stevie to search the answers on her on and sometimes getting herself in trouble for it. As she gets older she is more experienced and learns the answers that her mother tried keeping her away.
One thing that Stevie’s mother forgot to mention to her was to stay away from liking girls. Stevie did hear from her so called friend Carla and Yusef to stay away from the tomboy Willie Jean and not to act like boys. Back then the thought of being a homosexual was considered a taboo and whoever was known to be one was an outcast. Stevie was misled to think that homosexuality was wrong and if you did like the opposite sex you would be considered a sinner.
Later on in the chapters, Stevie started to unfold her real self little by little. At the age of sixteen, she has a boyfriend named Sean. They have been in a relationship for six months and finally they both decide to have sex. Stevie is once led to believe that having sex is a norm and if he loved Sean she had to have sexual relationships. At the time when they are both having intercourse Stevie tells Sean to stop because she was in pain. Sean is inpatient and tells her that he can’t wait until the next time they do it again and she responds that there will be no next time. They end up breaking up and Stevie realizes that she was not in love with Sean she was just impressed. As I read this chapter I suspected that Stevie did not like the opposite sex and was attracted to the same sex.
Stevie would seek for advice to the School nurse. The School nurse was a white woman named Ms. Horn. Stevie was the schools nurse helper and they would spend a lot of time together. She was always having thought and dreams of her rescuing her from drowning and giving her mouth to mouth. This was not normal for her to feel this way. Stevie did not know how to explain to Carla how she did not like Sean and wanted to talk to her about Ms. Horn but Carla demanded her not to tell her anything about her homosexual feeling. Stevie felt like an outcast. As Stevie confessed her feelings to Ms. Horn, Ms. Horn clarified that it is normal to have homosexual and heterosexual feeling because she is still growing up.
As I reflected on how Stevie was feeling through her teenage year I can say I relate to her. As I was growing I never got answers from my parents. Their advice was to stay away from bad influences but the more they told me to stay away the more I would seek my friends. As I saw how Stevie felt about her homosexual feeling, I got a different perspective on how that happens to many teens. I haven’t experienced it myself but I have a better understanding of how it feels. Overall I like this book because it was something new and different.
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