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a658006
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She 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.
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Betty Smith |
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fe9bd27
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All my life I've been lonely. I've been lonely at crowded parties. I've been lonely in the middle of kissing a girl and I've been lonely at camp with hundreds of fellows around. But now I'm not lonely any more.
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Betty Smith |
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0a6f061
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People always think that happiness is a faraway thing ... something complicated and hard to get. Yet, what little things can make it up.
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Betty Smith |
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a195591
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And the child, Francie Nolan, was of all the Rommelys and all the Nolans. She had the violent weaknesses and passion for beauty of the shanty Nolans. She was a mosaic of her grandmother Rommely's mysticism, her tale-telling, her great belief in everything and her compassion for the weak ones. She had a lot of her grandfather Rommely's cruel will. She had some of her Aunt Evy's talent for mimicking, some of Ruthie Nolan's possessiveness. She..
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Betty Smith |
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6dcf94d
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Say something," demanded Fancie. "Why don't you say something?" "What can I say?"
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Betty Smith |
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99afa18
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Mother, I am young. Mother, I am just eighteen. I am strong. I will work hard, Mother. But I do not want this child to grow up just to work hard. What must I do, mother, what must I do to make a different world for her? How do I start?" "The secret lies in the reading and the writing. You are able to read. Every day you must read one page from some good book to your child. Every day this must be until the child learns to read. Then she must..
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Betty Smith |
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615c762
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people always think that happiness is a far away thing, something complicated and hard to get. yet, 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 little things make happiness.
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Betty Smith |
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46243d1
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The difference between rich and poor", said Francie, "is that the poor do everything with thier own hands and the rich hire hands to do things."
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Betty Smith |
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c1fc5ac
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In the future, when something comes up, you tell exactly how it happened but write down for yourself the way you think it should have happened. Tell the truth and write the story. Then you won't get mixed up. It was the best advice Francie every got.
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truth
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Betty Smith |
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8b6356e
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This could be a whole life," she thought. "You work eight hours a day covering wires to earn money to buy food and to pay for a place to sleep so that you can keep living to come back to cover more wires. Some people are born and kept living just to come to this..."
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work
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Betty Smith |
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3161cb9
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But the penciled sheets did not seem like nor smell like the library book so she had given it up, consoling herself with the vow that when she grew up, she would work hard, save money and buy every single book that she liked.
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reading
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Betty Smith |
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3760651
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New York! I've always wanted to see it and now I've see it. It's true what they say-- it's the most wonderful city in the world.
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Betty Smith |
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b9aa8f2
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Sissy had two great failings. She was a great lover and a great mother. She had so much of tenderness in her, so much of wanting to give of herself to whoever needed what she had, whether it was her money, her time, the clothes off her back, her pity, her understanding, her friendship or her companionship and love. She was mother to everything that came her way. She loved men, yes. She loved women too, and old people and especially children..
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Betty Smith |
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fea6e29
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Growing up spoiled a lot of things. It spoiled the nice game they had when there was nothing to eat in the house. When money gave out and food ran low, Katie and the children pretended they were explorers discovering the North Pole and had been trapped by a blizzard in a cave with just a little food. They had to make it last till help came. Mama divided up what food there was in the cupboard and called it rations and when the children were ..
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Betty Smith |
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14f2fd2
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I guess being needed is almost as good as being loved. Maybe better.
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Betty Smith |
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f4d5435
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Oh time...time, pass so that I forget! Oh time, Great Healer, pass over me and let me forget.
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Betty Smith |
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74f0301
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I don't know. 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. At least she knows she's living.
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Betty Smith |
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be0426d
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t]he 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 . She must start out by believing things 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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52aaba0
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She told Papa about it. He made her stick out her tongue and he felt her wrist. He shook his head sadly and said, "You have a bad case, a very bad case." "Of what?" "Growing up."
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Betty Smith |
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a7efae6
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Some people do crossword puzzles. I do books.
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Betty Smith |
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0d769dc
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You won't die, Francie. You were born to lick this rotten life.
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Betty Smith |
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a1f14fc
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Isn't hot coffee a wonderful thing? How did people get along before it was invented?
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Betty Smith |
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f10980c
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It's a beautiful religion and I wish I understood it more. No, I don't want to understand it all. It's beautiful because it's always a mystery. Sometimes I say I don't believe in God and Jesus and Mary. I'm a bad Catholic because I miss mass once in a while and I grumble when, at confession, I get a heavy penance for something I couldn't help doing. But good or bad, I am a Catholic and I'll never be anything else. Of course, I didn't ask to..
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Betty Smith |
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0a52acf
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Brooklyn was a dream. All the things that happened there just couldn't happen. It was all dream stuff. Or was it all real and true and was it that she, Francie, was the dreamer?
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imagination
dreams
hope
growing-up
leaving
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Betty Smith |
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3ed6c88
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For quite a while, Francie had been spelling out letters, sounding them and then putting the sounds together to mean a word. But one day, she looked at a page and the word "mouse" had instantaneous meaning. She looked at the word, and the picture of a gray mouse scampered through her mind. She looked further and when she saw "horse," she heard him pawing the ground and saw the sun glint on his glossy coat. The word "running" hit her suddenl..
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Betty Smith |
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c4b8cff
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Because 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 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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imagination
ugliness
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Betty Smith |
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8528d06
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Everything, decided Francie after that first lecture, was vibrant with life and there was no death in chemistry. She was puzzled as to why learned people didn't adopt chemistry as a religion.
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religion
life
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Betty Smith |
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a75bfbf
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She went out and took a last long look at the shabby little library. She knew she would never see it again. Eyes changed after they looked at new things. If in the years to be she were to come back, her new eyes might make everything seem different from the way she saw it now. The way it was now was the way she wanted to remember it.
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Betty Smith |
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caad565
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Then I've been drunk, too," admitted Francie. "On beer?" "No. Last spring, in McCarren's Park, I saw a tulip for the first time in my life."
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Betty Smith |
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8ced7cc
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I never listen to what people tell me and I can't read. The only way I know what is right and wrong is the way I feel about things. If I feel bad, it's wrong. If I feel good, it's right.
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Betty Smith |
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5d7ea9f
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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 had practice in disappointment 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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021cb5b
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Who wants to die? Everything struggles to live. Look at that tree growing up there out of that 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. My children will be strong that way," said Katie.
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Betty Smith |
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520441d
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It was a good thing that she got herself into this other school. It showed her that there were other worlds beside the world she had been born into and that these other worlds were not unattainable.
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Betty Smith |
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2a3eaed
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A person who pulls himself up from a low environment via the bootstrap route has two choices. Having risen above his environment, he can forget it; or, he can rise above it and never forget it and keep compassion and understanding in his heart for those he has left behind him in the cruel upclimb.
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Betty Smith |
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9f27ed5
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She had heard Papa sing so many songs about the heart; the heart that was breaking - was aching - was dancing -was heavy laden - that leaped for joy - that was heavy in sorrow - that turned over - that stood still. She really believed the heart actually did those things.
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Betty Smith |
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0a16e65
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I'll not punish you for having an imagination.
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Betty Smith |
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4764526
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No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps, and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in the tenements districts.... That was the kind of tree it was. It liked poor people.
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Betty Smith |
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20aaebb
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When night draws back the curtain, And pins it with a star, Remember you are still my friend, Though you may wander far
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Betty Smith |
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ae1196f
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But this tree in the yard-this tree that men chopped down...this tree that they built a bonfire around, trying to burn up it's stump-this tree lived! It lived! And nothing could destroy it.
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Betty Smith |
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452dfae
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It was so simple that a flash of astonishment that felt like pain shot through her head. Education! That was it! It was education that made the difference! Education would pull them ut of the grame and dirt.
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Betty Smith |
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29ce6ab
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Everything struggles to live.
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Betty Smith |
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3f16b25
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Filth, filth, filth, from morning to night. I know they're poor but they could wash. Water is free and soap is cheap. Just look at that arm, nurse.' The nurse looked and clucked in horror. Francie stood there with the hot flamepoints of shame burning her face. The doctor was a Harvard man, interning at the neighborhood hospital. Once a week, he was obliged to put in a few hours at one of the free clinics. He was going into a smart practice ..
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Betty Smith |
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9e895be
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There is here, what is not in the old country. In spite of hard, unfamiliar things, there is here - hope. In the old country, a man can be no more than his father, providing he works hard. If his father was a carpenter, he may be a carpenter. He many not be a teacher or a priest. He may rise - but only to his father's state. In the old country, a man is given to the past. Here he belongs to the future. In this land, he may be what he will, ..
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Betty Smith |
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e6a7ba9
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She was surprised at how tiny the school seemed now. She supposed it was just as big as it had ever been only her eyes had grown used to looking at bigger things.
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Betty Smith |