Mother! Katie remembered. She had called her own mother "mama" until the day she had told her that she was going to marry Johnny. She had said, "Mother, I'm going to marry..." She had never said "mama" after that. She had finished growing up when she stopped calling her mother “mama.” Now Francie…
Betty SmithAnd that’s where the whole trouble is,” thought Francie. “We’re too much alike to understand each other because we don’t even understand our own selves. Papa and I were two different persons and we understood each other. Mama understands Neeley because he’s different from her. I wish I was different in the way that Neeley is.”
“Then everything’s all right now between us?” Katie asked with a smile.
“Of course.” Francie smiled back and kissed her mother’s cheek.
But in their secret hearts each knew that it wasn’t all right and that it would never be all right between them again.
Our family used to be like this strong cup,” thought Francie. “It was whole and sound and held things well. When papa died, the first crack came. And this fight tonight made another crack. Soon there will be so many cracks that the cup will break and we'll all be pieces instead of the whole thing together. I don't want this to happen, yet I'm deliberately making a deep crack.
Betty SmithWouldn't it be more of a free country," persisted Francie "if we could ride in them free?" "No." "Why?" "Because that would be Socialism," concluded Johnny triumphantly, "and we don't want that over here." "Why?" "Because we got democracy and that's the best thing there is," clinched Johnny.
Betty SmithTags: democracy
Now his children are getting old too, like him, and they have children and nobody wants the old man any more and they are waiting for him to die. But he don't want to die. He wants to keep on living even though he's so old and there's nothing to be happy about any more.
Betty SmithThe child must have a valuable thing which Is called imagination. The child must have a secret world in which live things that never were. It is necessary that she believe. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, she can reach back and live in her imagination.... Only by having these things in my mind can I live beyond what I have to live for.
Betty SmithShe loved books. She loved them with her senses and her intellect. They way they looked and smelled; the way they felt in her hands; the way the pages seemed to murmur as she turned them. Everything there is in the world, she thought, is in books.
Betty SmithFrom that time on, the world was hers for the reading.
Betty SmithHe talked about democracy and good citizenship and about a good world where everyone did the best he could for the common good of all.
Betty SmithShe sat in the sunshine watching the life on the street and guarding within herself, her own mystery of life.
Betty SmithTags: life motherhood pregnancy
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