The Bean Trees

by Barbara Kingsolver

“Mama, when Daddy was alive . . .” She was not sure what she meant to ask. Did you talk to each other? Was he the person you saved things up to say to, or was it like now? A houseful of women for everything, for company.

“It’s terrible to lose somebody,” I said, “I mean, I don’t know firsthand, but I can imagine it must be. But it’s also true that some people never have anybody to lose, and I think that’s got to be so much worse.”

“A man, a plan, a canal: Panama!” (which he said was a typical gringo way of looking at that endeavor), and “Able was I ere I saw Elba,” which was what Napoleon supposedly said when he was sent into exile. I

“Mi’ija, in a world as wrong as this one, all we can do is to make things as right as we can.”

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.