Katie had a fierce desire for survival which made her a fighter. Johnny had a hankering after immortality which made him a useless dreamer. And that was the great difference between these two who loved each other so well.
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.”
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.
This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks, Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight, Stand like Druids of eld.
There had to be the dark and muddy waters so that the sun could have something to background its flashing glory.
Johnny was all for telling Thomas Rommely but Mary begged him not to just yet. Thomas hated Johnny Nolan because he was Irish. He hated the Germans, he hated Americans, he hated the Russians, but he just couldn’t stand the Irish. He was fiercely racial in spite of his stupendous hatred of his race and he had a theory that marriage between two of alien races would result in mongrel children. “What would I get if I mated a canary with a crow?” was his argument.
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.
In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too. It makes a person rich in character.
worn-out copy of Shakespeare in the files, about to be discarded, which Sissy could have. She bought it. It was a tattered old volume containing all the plays and sonnets. It had intricate footnotes and detailed explanations as to the playwright’s meaning. There was a biography and picture of the author and steel-cut engravings illustrating scenes from each play. It was printed in small type, two columns to the page on thin paper. It cost Sissy twenty-five cents.
“Cut off the top neatly. Cut strips down into the can the length of your finger. Let each strip be so wide.” She measured two inches with her fingers. “Bend the strips backward. The can will look like a clumsy star. Make a slit in the top. Then nail the can, a nail in each strip, in the darkest corner of your closet. Each day put five cents in it. In three years there will be a small fortune, fifty dollars. Take the money and buy a lot in the country.
“Dear God,” she prayed, “let me be something every minute of every hour of my life. Let me be gay; let me be sad. Let me be cold; let me be warm. Let me be hungry…have too much to eat. Let me be ragged or well dressed. Let me be sincere—be deceitful. Let me be truthful; let me be a liar. Let me be honorable and let me sin. Only let me be something every blessed minute. And when I sleep, let me dream all the time so that not one little piece of living is
“Dear God,” she prayed, “let me be something every minute of every hour of my life. Let me be gay; let me be sad. Let me be cold; let me be warm. Let me be hungry…have too much to eat. Let me be ragged or well dressed. Let me be sincere—be deceitful. Let me be truthful; let me be a liar. Let me be honorable and let me sin. Only let me be something every blessed minute. And when I sleep, let me dream all the time so that not one little piece of living is ever lost.
