 I am from Chicago, I grew up there. I attend the Chicago Public Schools all my life. Which, of course, qualifies me as a functional illiterate. They taught us the same things they teach everybody else. Things like, how to conjugate the verb to be. I be, you be, he be. You taught us how to fight. You had to know how to fight or you couldn't graduate. I was scared somebody was going to see me fighting and tell my mother. Then I'd have to go home and fight her. She didn't believe in little girl fighting either. She'd tell me she'd say, Ladies, don't fight!