How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Surprisingly, Angel had agreed to move back in until after her mother and grandmother's visit. He might be hard to talk to and unreasonable in every other way but at least, Lou Ann realized, he knew the power of mothers and grandmothers. If Granny Logan had known there were getting a divorce she would have had an apoplectic. At the very least, she and Ivy would insist that Lou Ann come back home. (4.6)
To Granny Logan and Ivy Logan, Kentucky will always be "home." Even Lou Ann, who's been living in Tucson with Angel for years, can't help but think of her childhood home as her "real" home too. But she'll still go to extremes to play happy couple with her estranged husband to keep from going back.
Quote #2
Back at the house she laid down the baby for his nap, then carefully washed the produce and put it in the refrigerator, all the while feeling her mother's eyes on her hands. [...] She moved around the edges of the rooms as though her big mother and demanding grandmother were still there taking up most of the space; the house felt both empty and cramped at the same time, and Lou Ann felt a craving for something she couldn't put a finger on, maybe some kind of food she had eaten a long time ago. (4.81)
After her mother and grandmother head back to Kentucky, Lou Ann's house is haunted by their presence. They've reminded Lou Ann what a house full of women can feel like, and have inspired her with a powerful sense of connection to her own childhood home in Kentucky. We wonder if the food she's craving is fried chicken?
Quote #3
She heard Angel in the kitchen. He moved around in there for quite a while before he said anything to Lou Ann, and it struck her that his presence was different from the feeling of women filling up the house. He could be there, or not, and it hardly made any difference. Like a bug or a mouse scratching in the cupboard at night—you could get up and chase after it, or just go back to sleep and let it be. This was good, she decided. (4.86)
After five years of marriage, Lou Ann begins to feel that sharing a house with Angel is like sharing space with a stranger. For some reason, his presence doesn't make her feel that their little rented house is really a home. To Lou Ann, that's a sure sign that something crucial is missing between them. He's no angel, after all.
Quote #4
We had worked things out: I cooked on weekends, and also on any week night that Lou Ann had kept Turtle. It would be a kind of payment. And she would do the vacuuming, because she liked to, and I would wash dishes because I didn't mind them. [...] Before, it had seemed picayune to get all bent out of shape organizing the household chores. Now I was beginning to see the point. (7.73)
Although Taylor insists that she and Lou Ann can't fall into the habit of acting like husband and wife, the two of them do eventually settle into a comfortable routine. Together, they build a sense of "home" that feels richer than the one Lou Ann shared with Angel. Even if picayune sounds more like the kinds of chilies Lou Ann ends up canning than the triviality of chores.
Quote #5
"Is this from Guatemala?" I asked.
She nodded. She looked almost happy.
"Sometimes I get homesick for Pittman and it's as ugly as a mud stick fence," I said. "A person would have to just ache for a place where they make things as beautiful as this." (7.95-97)
More than any other character in The Bean Trees, Esperanza feels her dislocation as a source of constant pain. Taylor doesn't know it yet at this point, but it isn't just homesickness for Guatemala that keeps Esperanza down: every day, Esperanza struggles with the anguish of having left her daughter behind. Hence the "almost happy"—this is a character for whom "almost" is as good as it gets.
Quote #6
I couldn't really listen. I looked through the bones to the garden on the other side. There was a cactus with bushy arms and a coat of yellow spikes as thick as fur. A bird had built her nest in it. In and out she flew among the horrible spiny branches, never once hesitating. You just couldn't imagine how she'd made a home in there. (8.150)
After a visit to the doctor reveals the extent of Turtle's past physical injuries, Taylor is struck with a deep sense of sorrow. In this moment, the bird whose nest is in the cactus takes on symbolic significance, as Taylor can't imagine how Turtle survived the abusive home life she once endured. To say the least, it isn't just for the birds.
Quote #7
You're asking yourself, Can I give this child the best possible upbringing and keep her out of harm's way her whole life long? The answer is no, you can't. But nobody else can either. Not a state home, that's for sure. For heaven's sake, the best they can do is turn their heads while the kids learn to pick locks and snort hootch, and then try to keep them out of jail. Nobody can protect a child from the world. That's why it's the wrong thing to ask, if you're really trying to make a decision. (13.55)
After Turtle is attacked in Roosevelt Park, Taylor sinks into a depression so low that she can't imagine being able to give Turtle the stable home life she deserves. But, as Mattie tells Taylor, letting Turtle be admitted into a state home isn't the answer. Taylor may not be able to give Turtle a perfect home or a perfect life, but who the heck can give a perfect existence to anyone? The love she can offer sure is better than what the state can do.
Quote #8
"Do you miss your home a lot?" I asked Estevan. "I know that's a stupid question. But does it make you tired, being so far away from what you know? That's how I feel sometimes, that I would just like to crawl in a hole somewhere and rest. Go dormant, like those toad frogs Mattie told us about. And for you it's just that much worse; you're not even speaking your own language." (14.26)
Although Taylor doesn't often say that she misses Pittman County, this conversation with Estevan reveals that she does feel uprooted now that she's living in Tucson. Kentucky may not mean the same thing to her as it does to Lou Ann, but it's a part of her all the same.
Quote #9
He let out a long breath. "I don't even know anymore which home I miss. Which level of home. In Guatemala City I missed the mountains. My own language is not Spanish, did you know that?" (14.27)
As Taylor slowly realizes, Estevan and Esperanza have experienced more than one kind of dislocation in their lives. As Mayans who lived initially in mountain villages then later moved to Guatemala City, the couple went through major cultural and linguistic shifts well before they ever came to the U.S. as refugees. They've faced a mountain of difficulty, that's for sure.
Quote #10
"You know where we're going now? We're going home."
She swung her heels against the seat. "Home, home, home, home," she sang.
The poor kid had spent so much of her life in a car, she probably felt more at home on the highway than anywhere else. "Do you remember home?" I asked her. "That house where we live with Lou Ann and Dwayne Ray? We'll be there before you know it." (17.184-186)
By the end of the novel, Taylor has come to think of Tucson as home, and, most importantly, she's come to think of the house she shares with Lou Ann, Dwayne Ray, and Turtle as "home" too. Although the highway stretches before them, heading west, the two aren't driving off into the sunset of the great unknown; instead, they're returning to a place they've come to know and love. Now doesn't that make ya feel all warm and fuzzy inside?