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3779409
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Katie had married Johnny because she liked the way he sang and danced and dressed. Womanlike, she set about changing all those things in him after marriage.
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Betty Smith |
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daf20ce
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The library was a little old shabby place. Francie thought it was beautiful. The feeling she had about it was as good as the feeling she had about church. She pushed open the door and went in. She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library paste and freshly inked stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.
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Betty Smith |
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3301c61
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I don't know. I don't know anything, really. I just feel. And when the feeling is strong enough, then I just say I know. But I don't...
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Betty Smith |
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cb9c373
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And she doesn't have to worry about me, either. I don't need to drink to get drunk. I can get drunk on things like the tulip--and this night.
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Betty Smith |
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d873ed0
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Anybody," said Johnny, carried away by his personal dream of Democracy, "can ride in one of the hansom cabs, provided," he qualified, "they get the money. So you can see what a free country we got here." "What's free about it if you have to pay?" asked Francie. "It's free in this way: If you have the money you're allowed to ride in them no matter who you are. In the old countries, certain people aren't free to ride in them, even if they hav..
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Betty Smith |
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aebee5b
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But she didn't want to recall things. She wanted to live things -- or as a compromise, relive rather than reminisce.
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recalling
reminscing
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Betty Smith |
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6e9395e
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People always think that happiness is a faraway thing," thought Francie, "something complicated and hard to get. Yet, what little things can make it up; a place of shelter when it rains--a cup of strong hot coffee when you're blue; for a man, a cigarette for contentment; a book to read when you're alone--just to be with someone you love. Those things make happiness." --
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Betty Smith |
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7ca545d
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Most women had the one thing in common: they had great pain when they gave birth to their children. This should make a bond that held them all together; it should make them love and protect each other against the man-world. But it was not so. It seemed like their great birth pains shrank their hearts and their souls. They stuck together for only one thing: to trample on some other woman...whether it was by throwing stones or by mean gossip...
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Betty Smith |
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727b27c
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That is what is called learning the truth. It is a good thing to learn the truth one's self. To first believe with all your heart, and then not to believe, is good too. It fattens the emotions and makes them to stretch. When as a woman life and people disappoint her, she will have a practice in disappoinment and it will not come so hard. In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too. It makes a person rich in character.
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Betty Smith |
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5c15770
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Was that a bad lady, Papa?" she asked eagerly. No." But she looked bad." There are very few bad people. There are just a lot of people that are unlucky."
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Betty Smith |
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c31f83c
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The neighborhood stores are an important part of a city child's life. They are his contact with the supplies that keep life going; they hold the beauty that his soul longs for; they hold the unattainable that he can only dream and wish for.
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Betty Smith |
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6c8afe5
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He talked about democracy and good citizenship and about a good world where everyone did the best he could for the common good of all.
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Betty Smith |
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86f5202
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She liked numbers and sums. She devised a game in which each number was a family member and the "answer" made a family grouping with a story to it. Naught was a babe in arms. He gave no trouble. Whenever he appeared you just "carried" him. The figure 1 was a pretty baby girl just learning to walk, and easy to handle; 2 was a baby boy who could walk and talk a little. He went into family life (into sums, etc.) with very little trouble. And 3..
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Betty Smith |
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eebf8f6
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Maybe," thought Francie, "she doesn't love me as much as she loves Neeley. But she needs me more than she needs him and I guess being needed is almost as good as being loved."
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Betty Smith |
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a0a5129
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Francie said nothing more. Katie knew that she was letting them down. But she couldn't help it, she just couldn't help it. Yes, she should go with them to lend the comfort and authority of her presence but she knew she couldn't stand the ordeal. Yet, they had to be vaccinated. Her being with them or somewhere else couldn't take that fact away. So why shouldn't one of the three be spared? Besides, she said to her conscience, it's a hard and ..
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Betty Smith |
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f271368
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Do you hear that, Francie? You're in college! 'oh gosh, I feel sick.
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Betty Smith |
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b9f9ef7
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Eyes changed after they looked at new things.
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Betty Smith |
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0d06d7f
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Francie of course became an outsider shunned by all because of her stench. But she had grown accostumed to being lonely. She was used to walking alone and being considered different. She did not suffer to much.
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Betty Smith |
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efb509f
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So she learned ways of conserving bits of seconds. Long before the train ground to a stop at her station, she pushed her way to the door to be one of the first expelled when it slid open. Out of the train, she ran like a deer, circling the crowd to be the first up the stairs leading to the street. Walking to the office, she kept close to the buildings so she could turn corners sharply. She crossed streets kittycorner to save stepping off an..
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Betty Smith |
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46ac6ce
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She loved the library and was anxious to worship the lady in charge. But the librarian had other things on her mind. She hated children anyhow.
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Betty Smith |
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28acf9a
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She was the books she read in the library.
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Betty Smith |
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4439259
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And you must tell the child the legends I told you--as my mother told them to me and her mother to her. You must tell the fairy tales of the old country. You must tell of those not of the earth who live forever in the hearts of people--fairies, elves, dwarfs and such. You must tell of the great ghosts that haunted your father's people and of the evil eye which a hex put on your aunt. You must teach the child of the signs that come to the wo..
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Betty Smith |
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e8e7146
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I'm glad I got you!
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Betty Smith |
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4d2ecc7
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An eleven-year-old girl sitting on this fire escape could imagine that she was living in a tree.
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Betty Smith |
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217fbe5
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Education! That was it! It was education that made the difference! Education would pull them out of the grime and dirt.
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Betty Smith |
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675089f
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But she didn't want to recall things. She wanted to live things - or as a compromise, re-live rather than reminisce.
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francie
betty-smith
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Betty Smith |
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982e9bf
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But in their secret hearts, each new that it wasn't all right and would never be all right between them again.
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francie
betty-smith
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Betty Smith |
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a982183
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The tears stood in her eyes.
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betty-smith
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Betty Smith |
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153668b
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She had born a child but two hours ago. She was so weak that she couldn't lift her head an inch from the pillow, yet it was she who comforted him and told him not to worry, that she would take care of him.
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Betty Smith |
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e695bd2
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I don't know," Miss Lizzie said. "Sometimes I think it's better to suffer bitter unhappiness and to fight and to scream out, and even to suffer that terrible pain, than just to be...safe." She waited until the next scream died away. "At least she knows she's living." --
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Betty Smith |
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f07b6a4
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Johnny had been on earth for thirty-four years. Less than a week ago, he walked on those streets. And now the cup, the ring and two unironed waiter's aprons at home were the only concrete objects left to connote that a man had once lived. There were no other physical reminders of Johnny, as he had been buried in all the clothes he owned with his studs and his fourteen-carat gold collar button.
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Betty Smith |
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0cb08d3
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Gently, Teacher explained the difference between a lie and a story. A lie was something you told because you were mean or a coward. A story was something you made up out of something that might have happened. Only you didn't tell it like it was; you told it like you thought it should have been.
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Betty Smith |
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95ab755
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the 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. She must start out by believing in things not of this world. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination.
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Betty Smith |
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2e4c28d
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She did not hate Miss Garnder anymore. She didn't like her, but she felt sorry for her. Miss Garnder had nothing in all the world excepting a sureness about how right she was.
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Betty Smith |
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cc07141
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They were all slender, frail creatures with wondering Wes and soft fluttery voices. But they were all made out of thin invisible steel.
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women
inspirational
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Betty Smith |
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b653109
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Flossie was always running after men and they were always running away from her. Francie's Aunt Sissy ran after men, too. But somehow they ran to meet her halfway.
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Betty Smith |
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8c7164e
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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.
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Betty Smith |
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31251bb
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Wouldn'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."
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Betty Smith |
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f61e5b4
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I don't need to drink to get drunk. I can get drunk on things like the tulip---and this night.
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Betty Smith |
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dab21ff
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She looked at the nurse. To Francie, all women were mamas like her own mother and Aunt Sissy and Aunt Evy. She thought the nurse might say something like: "Maybe this little girl's mother works and didn't have time to wash her good this morning," or, "You know how it is, Doctor, children will play in dirt." But what the nurse actually said was, "I know. Isn't it terrible? I sympathize with you, Doctor. There is no excuse for these people li..
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Betty Smith |
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1d3f963
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And you must tell the child the legends I told you--as my mother told them to me and her mother to her. You must tell the fairy tales of the old country. You must tell of those not of the earth who live forever in the hearts of the people...
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fairytales
legends
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Betty Smith |
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650696c
|
Don't say that. It's not better to die. Who wants to die? Everything struggles to live. Look at that tree growing up there from the grating. It gets no sun, and water only when it rains. It's growing out of sour earth. And it's strong because its hard struggle to live is making it strong.
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Betty Smith |
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51a364a
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The baby Francie crowed with delight as her grandmother held up the cruet and the sun shone through it and made a small fat rainbow on the opposite wall. Mary smiled with the child and made the rainbow dance. "Schon! Schon!" she said. "Shame! Shame!" repeated Francie and held out her two hands."
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Betty Smith |
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c967d6c
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Good-bye, Francie
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Betty Smith |