Rabbit the autobiography of miss pattis restaurant
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Metropolitan Museum Cleveland Museum of Art. Internet Arcade Console Living Room. Open Library American Libraries. But with no job skills and an eighth-grade education, her options were limited. She learned quickly that hustling and humor were the only tools she had to survive. Rabbit is an unflinching memoir of cinematic scope and unexpected humor.
Patricia Williams, the fifth child of an alcoholic single mother, came of age in Atlanta at the height of the crack epidemic. At 12, she had her first boyfriend; by 15 she was a mother of two. After numerous run-ins with the law and a stint behind bars, Williams decided to turn her life around. She now goes by the stage name Ms. Pat and enjoys a successful career as a comedian.
With not many options available to support herself and children, she hustled to get by.
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But a life of crime usually comes with consequences. When you hit the bottom you can either stay there, or fight your way to the top. There were two things in the book that just really stood out to me and I won't soon forget. The first was Pat's mom told her white people were better than her. I mean how does that not affect the self-esteem of a child?
How would that not crush your hopes and dreams that you could achieve anything you want in life? The other moment was when Pat was told she deserved better than her abusive boyfriend. She said other people told her he was scum, but it wasn't until someone told her she didn't deserve it, that it really sunk in. It just really blew my mind that essentially people were telling her the same thing all along, but it was the specific wording that made her finally understand.
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It really goes to show that if you know someone in an abusive relationship, don't ever stop telling them that they are worth something until they finally believe in themselves. The only reason this wasn't a five star read for me is I thought sometimes certain things were glossed over. For example, a pretty big part of the story talks about her difficulty in finding a job and keeping it.
But yet it doesn't really get into how she got the job where her husband works. There were a few times in the book that I wished there were more details. Overall though, this is definitely a compelling read and I recommend it to anyone who loves reading about people who overcome difficult odds. I won a free ebook from Bookshout and the publisher.
I was under no obligation to post a review and all views expressed are my honest opinion. Author 58 books Instagram Twitter Facebook Amazon Pinterest If you take away one thing from this book, make it this: she called President Jimmy Carter the N-word and gave him a free cheeseburger. Okay, so I totally forgot I had this book until I was cleaning out one of my storage cubes.
My friends and I have been exchanging bags of books over quarantine and somehow this one got away from me. It's actually really amazing, though, and if you're looking for Black authors to read in solidarity of BLM, this is a great one to add to the list because not only is it really fucking funnyit also is a serious reminder of how much poverty is influenced by racist infrastructures that perpetuate segregation on an institutional level and let people "slip through the cracks.
And I think that's often true across the board, but probably especially for Black women. Patricia Williams is now a comedian named "Ms. Pat," and Rabbit was her childhood nickname turned street name when she was selling drugs in the street. She talks about her bootlegger grandfather who kept a chain around his fridge and didn't think twice about shooting people who interrupted his favorite television shows; this is the first story and it's told with fondness because she says it's the only time in her childhood that she never went hungry.
Williams's mom was abusive, physically firing guns in the house to get their attention, beatings and neglectfully no food in the house, facilitating child abuse. One of her mother's boyfriends touched her and her sister when they were kids, and when, at twelve, she was seeing the twenty-year-old who got her pregnant with her first two kids, her mother basically just lifted an eyebrow and decided it was none of her business.
Shortly afterwards, she turned to selling drugs to keep her and her kids fed, which eventually landed her in jail. One of her caseworkers turned her to comedy, which she became a raging success at, both because of her candor and for her penchant for turning tragedy into humor. I loved the positive influences in her life-- the teacher, Ms. Troup, who brought her clothes and personal hygiene products for her to use before class so she wouldn't get bullied by other students, broke my heart.
That is the epitome of good teaching and I wish all teachers were that compassionate. I also loved the social worker who was so good to her when she was thirteen and pregnant and really tried so hard to get her all of the information and options she could. It made the bad influences even more awful, like her creepy adult boyfriend and the molester who groomed her as a child.
This is a pretty depressing story but it has a happy ending, and it shows why it's so offensive to romanticize a hard-scrabble life. I think there's a tendency in the U. And that trapdoor is often way bigger and steeper for people of color than it is for white people. Selling drugs is obviously not great, but when that's the only option other than starving, it becomes pretty clear why people turn to crime for lack of better solutions.
I really enjoyed this book and loved her sense of humor and honesty. I think others will, too. There were so many things in this book that shocked me. This is the story of a woman who was the fifth and youngest child in a family being raised by a single teenage mom.
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And, I guess I need to blame my middle class upbringing, but I had no idea there was still a such thing as an illegal liquor house. I thought those disappeared with prohibition! Pat fought her way through poverty at a level most Americans have no idea still exists in our country. This story has a rare happy ending - she ended up happily married and raising her children along with various the children of family members at any given time in a beautiful suburban neighborhood.
She became pregnant at the age of 13, had two children before she was By the time she was 16, she was living on her own raising not only her two children but four additional family members, supporting them selling crack on the street corner. There were a few people who helped her gain the life skills she needed along the way to leave her former life behind and become the person she is today.
Her husband Michael, who met her when she was still selling crack and showed her a better way to live, patiently supporting her journey along the way. There were two social workers and a teacher who also took an interest in helping her. Also, a very nice man who owned the laundromat in front of which she sold her drugs, he watched her children and helped with their homework while she sold drugs in front of his rabbit the autobiography of miss pattis restaurant.
She always believed that she would do better for her children than her mother did for her and she definitely succeeded. At one point she is talking about the boyfriend she had when she was This man was He was also married with a baby and another one on the way. She had no idea about any of those until she found herself pregnant at the age of 13 with his child.
In the mornings he would pick me up in his Chevy Nova and drive me to Dean Rusk elementary, where I was the only girl in seventh grade whose boyfriend had a car. This was the case of babies raising babies with literally no adult guidance. I have an incredible amount of respect for what she managed to achieve. Watching this child having to be alone while giving birth at the age of 13, being prayed upon by older man who should have never been allowed anywhere near her.
She and her siblings being hungry and never even having a toothbrush. It was difficult to read at certain points to say the least. It was extremely well written. I appreciate Miss Pat sharing her story with us. I also would love to sit down sometime and listen to her tell her stories. I think she is an amazing person and I have a tremendous amount of respect for her.
All the stars for this memoir. I think there are times that we believe we must be so different from other people based on how we grew up. There are very talented people in this world that can make us see our similarities. The beautiful similarities and the low down dirty similarities. Patricia Williams is one of those people. She grew up in Atlanta during the crack epidemic.
Although, the people that should have had her best interests at heart, did not Those who saw how wonderful Rabbit was and helped shaped her into Ms. How she overcame and paid it forward. A wonderful memoir of redemption through pain I highly recommend this read!! Great read Last week on my way to work I caught Ms. Pat on the Rickey Smiley show.
I was laughing my butt off. I went and purchased the book on my kindle the same day. And I laughed and cried. And for her to make a living out of telling her story. Is something I wanted to contribute to. Hope to see and hear more from Ms. Pat in the future. I kept seeing this book on my Goodreads timeline. Since the people I follow on Goodreads have excellent taste in books, I decided to read this one, and it did not disappoint.
To read the rest of this review and to see an interview featuring Ms. Patricia is honest and tells this in the language of her original illegal saloon home. Her spirit comes through and she is brave to tell some of the minutia she has experienced within the years from 13 to Those years especially. It's beyond crude language and there is immense abuse coming from nearly all angles.
Parental and partner and from each generation to another. Some of it is beyond rational, IMHO. Like after being shot herself, THEN becoming concerned about her kids sitting in a car for 2 or 3 hours at a time when all kinds of action is happening around them. Greatly violent and otherwise.
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Viewing actions too done in public that no one should ever witness as they are lewd. That hit home because I remember so well my own Mother in great age crying her eyes out because she saw such a sight on her own front porch. No adults to protect the innocent. Beyond that, no innocence exists for them, these babies and children. Not only about the sexual but about the personal or states of disability physical needs or any of their own privacy.
Or privacy to others most dire and far more than less than flattering moments. All mostly highly against laws already on the books- but which are daily observable to the children. I love the picture on the cover. She looks like such a live wire, I can understand the nickname of Rabbit. She's bright and she is able to cut a terrible tie and she ends up finding a man who helps her do better.
I was most touched by his teaching her and braving her ire in return for demonstrating and showing her how to eat in company while holding a fork and other utensils correctly. That's the types of human being most needed- role models. Someone who doesn't enable but demands changes for better, regardless of the back bite they receive. And WILL it come!!
She's wants to get a GED and with his teaching of manner, language parsing, style of worth for various material things that all "look the same" to her? And has become "with" by habit. Lots of kids in this picture and she ends up at different times supporting up to 8 or 12 sister's in jail or nieces who never go home] besides her own kids. Lots of honesty.
It's not fun to read. All told for the length- it's short. And she deals the dirt of the truth which doesn't put herself into any special light or make generalizations about dozens of others or entire systems. It's not a bad effort at all. I hope her energy lasts and she doesn't cave. The struggle nobody talks about is what it feels like to be invisible, or to know in your heart that nobody cares.
I always find it difficult to rate memoirs, as I don't think I can "rate" anyone's life, but this is about rating my reading experience. At first I thought I may not be able to finish this book as it is very much an in your face experience, and I was wondering if the author was trying to shock us with some of the sex talk and profanity, but I then realized this is the way it was, so she can't change that to make me more comfortable.
A very quick, sad but inspiring read about how Rabbit turned her life around, but also showing me a world I knew nothing about. I think her husband must be a phenomenal person - he always believed in her, and never said no when he was asked to help out her family. The Story: This stand-up comedian, who performs as Ms. Pat, grew up in Atlanta during the crack epidemic, one of five children of an alcoholic single mother.
By 15, Ms. Williams had two children of her own. She went on to sell crack she was shot twice and spent time in jail. Now, living in Indianapolis, she is a regular guest on comedy podcasts and has appeared on television shows This stand-up comedian, who performs as Ms. Maybe you've caught her on a podcast. I haven't and in fact had never heard of her before.
Born poor to an alcoholic single mom, she didn't have many choices or chances to improve her life. A 20 year old charmer got her pregnant at the age of 13 and again at Things just got even tougher. Selling crack might make things easier, certainly the money was rolling in; but then her criminal record surfaced 20 pages long when printedmaking it impossible to find any legit job outside of McDonald's.
I was given an ebook copy of this a year ago but saw that it was available on hoopla, so If you listen to this, it's an experience you won't soon forget! Not only for the in your face, humorous story telling, but for the author's gruff voice and stilted narration. Much of the story focused on her childhood. Well, actually she was living as an adult at 13, raising 6 kids at 16 not all hers.
I would have liked to know more about her life as a comic and the podcasts.