The Bean Trees

by Barbara Kingsolver

“The way I see it,” she said, “a person isn’t nothing more than a scarecrow. You, me, Earl Wickentot, the President of the United States, and even God Almighty, as far as I can see. The only difference between one that stands up good and one that blows over is what kind of a stick they’re stuck up there on.”

“The next phone booth we come to, I’m going to have to call 1-800-THE LORD.”

Whatever you want the most, it’s going to be the worst thing for you.”

What the hell. Live free or bust.

the only reason I have any friends at all is because I’m always careful not to say something totally dumb, and if I blow it just one time, then that’s it.”

picayune

Even a spotted pig looks black at night. This is another thing Mama used to tell me quite often. It means that things always look different, and usually better, in the morning.

“Bean trees,” she said, as plainly as if she had been thinking about it all day. We looked where she was pointing. Some of the wisteria flowers had gone to seed, and all these wonderful long green pods hung down from the branches.

They looked as much like beans as anything you’d ever care to eat.

“Will you look at that,” I said. It was another miracle. The flower trees were ...

My theory was that Lou Ann suffered from the same disease as Snowboots: feeling guilty for things beyond your wildest imagination.

Personal connection

“You were just looking for a disaster, that’s all. You can’t deny you hunt for them,

If you look hard enough you can always come up with what you want.”

There is no point in treating a depressed person as though she were just feeling sad, saying, There now, hang on, you’ll get over it. Sadness is more or less like a head cold—with patience, it passes. Depression is like cancer.

“You know what really gets me?” I asked him. “How people call you ‘illegals.’ That just pisses me off, I don’t know how you can stand it. A human being can be good or bad or right or wrong, maybe. But how can you say a person is illegal?”

I realized that I had come to my own terms with the desert, but my soul was thirsty.

I’m your Ma, and that means I love you the most. Forever.

But this is the most interesting part: wisteria vines, like other legumes, often thrive in poor soil,

The wisteria vines on their own would just barely get by, is how I explained it to Turtle, but put them together with rhizobia and they make miracles.

nothing on this earth’s guaranteed, when you get right down to it, you know? I’ve been thinking about that. About how your kids aren’t really yours, they’re just these people that you try to keep an eye on, and hope you’ll all grow up someday to like each other and still be in one piece. What I mean is, everything you ever get is really just on loan. Does that make sense?”

“Like library books. Sooner or later they’ve all got to go back into the night drop.”

“Exactly. So what’s the point worrying yourself sick about it. You’d just as well enjo...