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Role of family adolescence
Role of family adolescence
Writing- relationship between mother and daughter
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One dies only when one is forgotten. However, there is not an effective way to shut down feelings, neither good ones nor bad ones. So even if one has died physically, one still lives mentally and emotionally in the minds and hearts of the ones left behind, and there is no worst feeling than missing something or someone that will never come back. Death is unexplainable and trying to make sense out of it is useless. But one thing is for sure; you can never love someone as much as you can miss him or her. So when a person one loves dies, one refuses to let oblivion take over. One wishes to hold on to even the smallest and most nonsense details and memories, due to the fact we, understandably, refuse to let that person go. Facing the devastating …show more content…
It has been extremely difficult for me to go through my loss, but I would never want to be in my mother’s shoes. My mother’s life has changed completely. She does not go a day without remembering my grandmother and she currently reminds me of how important it is to be a loving daughter. My mother strongly believes that my grandmother is now as happy as she has always deserved. However, now my grandmother’s loved ones carry an amount of pain that cannot go unnoticed. This relates to what Lily feels because the absence of her mother has affected every aspect of the teenage life she now lives. The importance of a mother’s role in a girl’s growth is unarguable. Lily thinks: “You can tell which girls lack mothers by the look of their hair. My hair was constantly going off in eleven wrong directions”(3). As silly as it might sound, those little types of details a mother does are what distinguish her presence from everybody else’s. Lily does not have nice clothes or the bracelets every girl has in her school, and she does not feel comfortable with the unfeminine way of being she has adopted. Worsening Lily’s internal issues, her lack of femininity excludes her from the other girls and these are the type of issues only motherly love and guidance can solve. Moreover, if her father would act as a proper father figure maybe Lily could solve her social and internal conflicts. Instead, T. Ray is the exact …show more content…
Ray’s cruel manners, one might think that if he would have been a more affectionate father he might be able to fill her mother’s void. The truth is that many loved ones or family members can help fill one’s mother’s absence, but it is never the same. On the other hand, a mother could easily take the place of all others. Kidd makes reference to this at the beginning of the book in a quote about bees from Man and Insects. It says: “The queen, for her part, is the unifying force of the community; if she is removed from the hive, the workers very quickly sense her absence. After a few hours, or even less, they show unmistakable signs of queenlessness.” In reference to the Queen Bee, a mother is what represents order, calmness, sweetness and shelter. That is why, without the presence of the mother everything can turn into chaos. Anyone can play a mother figure, but mother is only one. However, Rosaleen’s sincere love and care towards Lily act like blessings for her. Rosaleen represents the strong, determined, polite and good willed role model every girl should have. It is fair to say that Rosaleen saved Lily’s future as an independent woman. Without her, Lily would have never reached the Boatwrights and she would have never escaped her dark childhood, which easily foreshadows trouble and downfall as a young adult or grown up
In The Secret Life of Bees, written by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily lacks a mother figure in her life, which leads her on a compelling journey as she desperately searches for answers about her true mother. Her abusive father, T. Ray, causes Lily to run away along with Rosaleen, the housekeeper. They are led to the Boatwright household by one of the few things Lily still possesses from her mother, a Black Madonna Honey label. Lily is given the opportunity to create a mother-daughter type bond between her and the Boatwright sisters. August, one of the sisters, acts as the “queen bee” throughout the story. August teaches Lily that a mother does not have to be someone who you share blood with, but rather, a mother is
This “home” that she finds brightly displays the ideas of identity and feminine society. Though Lily could not find these attributes with T. Ray at the peach house, she eventually learns the truth behind her identity at the pink house, where she discovers the locus of identity that resides within herself and among the feminine community there. Just like in any coming-of-age story, Lily uncovers the true meaning of womanhood and her true self, allowing her to blossom among the feminine influence that surrounds her at the pink house. Lily finds acceptance among the Daughters of Mary, highlighting the larger meaning of acceptance and identity in the novel. The meaning behind Sonsyrea Tate’s statement can be found deeply rooted within Sue Monk Kidd’s novel, The Secret Life of Bees.
I really was impacted by T. Ray’s quote during the height of the tension about Lily’s past mistakes, “ ‘It was you who did it, Lily. You didn’t mean it, but it was you’ ” (Kidd 299). This moment was one of my favorites because it showed the growth the lead character had made toward not only forgiving her mother, but forgiving herself. When Lily chases after her father to finally get the raw truth about the fateful day her mom died, it reveals that she is finally ready to come to terms with her past, no matter what really happened. At the beginning of the book, she can’t accept her mother’s death, her disappearance, and her lack of love from her parents. Coincidentally, she grasps at any excuse to punish herself because she is unsure of who she is.
Lily is finally able to let go of the burdens she holds as her trust for August grows. She is able to come clean to August about all the lies and explains the real reason her and Rosaleen are in Tiburon. As the true story of Deborah unfolds, August is able to finally understand the troubles Lily face and how depleted the young girl is. With the help of August and all of the other influential black women Lily encounters along this journey, she is finally able to release her burdens and believe in the strength she possesses within. The last scene of the novel includes this powerful imagery of Lily’s new life, “I go back to that one moment when I stood in the driveway with small rocks and clumps of dirt around my feet and looked back at the porch. And there they were. All these mothers… They are the moons shining over me” (302). It is clear Lily can now grow and develop as the young woman she has always yearned to become with these important new women in her life there to guide her and be her supporters. They have shown Lily that she needs to be her own number one provider of love and strength, but as seen in this imagery, they will always be there when she needs them. By using this technique at the end of the book, Kidd is able to wrap Lily’s
A queen bee cares for all; cares for thousands of daughters and sons. Lily didn’t chose to
I think this is because she says that she wants to be “normal”. ” Because I just want to be normal for a little while-not a refugee girl looking for her mother, but a regular girl paying a summer visit to Tiburon, South Carolina.” This says how Lily desires to be “normal” and live a “normal life”. I believe this because her reaction to the news was incomprehensible. She didn’t take the time to actually listen to the reasons why her mom left or why her mom didn’t take Lily with her.
Sue Monk Kidd’s book, The Secret Life of Bees has an epigraph in every chapter that parallels the events in the story. In Chapter 14 the epigraph says, “A queenless colony is a pitiful and melancholy community; there may be a mournful wail or lament from within. Without intervention, the colony will die. But introduce a new queen and the most extravagant change takes place. - The Queen Must Die; And Other Affairs of Bees and Men” ( Kidd 277 ). The epigraph in Chapter 14 is related to the chapter because it parallels Lily’s adventures and role in the story. The queenless colony the epigraph mentions is talking about the absence of Lily’s mother and how it affects the characters in the story. A mournful wail is a metaphor to the guilt she feels because she is responsible for her mother’s passing. Lily keeps these feelings of remorse and guilt kept inside for a majority of her childhood. Lily has been trying to find a new life, and she does this by becoming the new queen, finally having control of her life.
This is important in the development of the story because it shows that Lily feels that Rosaleen, could be a replacement for her mom. In the same scene, Lily talks about the time she realized Rosaleen really did love her because she stood up for her. When T-Ray, Lily’s father, threatens to kill the bird Lily got from the mercantile, Rosaleen stands up for Lily. “He started to scoop at the biddy with his tractor-grease hands, but ROsaleen planted herself in front of him”(page 11). After doing this Rosaleen talks back to him, telling him that he should not touch the bird. This is important in the development of the story, since it shows that even though it is against Jim Crow Laws to talk back to a white person, Rosaleen still believes in standing up for what is right. The next scene which is significant revolves mostly around Jim Crow Laws and once again addresses Lily’s relationship with Rosaleen. “Once in awhile I had us living in a foreign country like New York, where she could adopt me and we both could stay our natural color”(page 12). Through these daydreams, it is clear that Lily thinks of Rosaleen as a mother to her and wishes that she could
In life, having someone to care and look after you is necessary. In many ways, a mother gives the love and care needed to help a child grow. In Sue Monk Kidd's, The Secret Life of Bees, Lily Owens, the main character, does not have a mother to look after her. However, it is the minor characters that play the mother figures in her life due to her mother's passing. May and Rosaleen are mother figures towards Lily. Throughout the story, Lily realizes that although she may not have her mom with her, there are many other women who she views as mother figures because of how they help her grow. The youngest sister May Boatwright and her housekeeper Rosaleen Daise are these mother figures. Firstly, they help Lily to feel loved. Due to her troubled
In the end of Sue Monk Kidd’s novel, The Secret Life of Bees, Lily finds herself. She becomes the person who she wants to be and finally finds someone who knows her favorite color. She faces reality straight on. Life takes
Death and Grieving Imagine that the person you love most in the world dies. How would you cope with the loss? Death and grieving is an agonizing and inevitable part of life. No one is immune from death’s insidious and frigid grip. Individuals vary in their emotional reactions to loss.
When the book begins, Lily is depressed and guilt-ridden over the loss of her mother and her father T. Ray’s cold and abusive behavior. These are symptoms of queenlessness, a hive in chaos. “The queen...is the unifying force of the community; if she is removed...the workers very quickly sense her absence. After a few hours...they show unmistakable signs of queenlessness” (Kidd 1). Without Deborah in the house, Lily and T. Ray suffered and the distance between them grew. Without a queen bee to give them a direction, they had no sense of community. Lily and T. Ray did not work together to prosper, and neither could function at their full
Rosaleen is the disciplinary figure in Lily?s life. She is tough and sometimes mean but really she loves Lily. Lily knew that ?despite her sharp ways, her heart was more tender than a flower skin and she loved her beyond reason?. Rosaleen also shows her love for Lily when she avoids telling Lily that her mother left her. She knew this would break Lily?s heart.
Over the course of several months, August guides, teaches, and helps Lily to accept and forgive herself. August once knew Deborah, and she knows that Lily is her daughter, but she does not confront Lily about the issue. Instead, she waits until Lily puts the puzzle pieces together and discovers for herself the relationship between her mother and August. August knows she is not ready to learn the truth about her mother when she and Lily first meet, so she waits for Lily to come to her. When Lily finally realizes the truth, she comes to August and they have a long discussion about Deborah. During this discussion, Lily learns the truth about her mother; that her mother only married T. Ray because she was pregnant with Lily, then after several years she had enough of living and dealing with T. Ray, so she left. Lily is disgusted by the fact that her mother would've done something like this, she did not want to let go of the romantic image of her mother she had painted in her mind (“‘The Secret Life of Bees’ Themes and Symbols of The Secret Life of Bees). Lily struggles to stomach the fact the her mother truly did leave her and she spends some time feeling hurt and angry, but one day, August shows her a picture of Lily and her mother. As Lily looks at the picture she is comforted and thinks, “May must’ve made it to heaven and explained to my mother about the sign I wanted. The one that would let me know I was loved” (Kidd 276). Seeing
Two years and four months ago I died. A terrible condition struck me, and I was unable to do anything about it. In a matter of less than a year, it crushed down all of my hopes and dreams. This condition was the death of my mother. Even today, when I talk about it, I burst into tears because I feel as though it was yesterday. I desperately tried to forget, and that meant living in denial about what had happened. I never wanted to speak about it whenever anyone would ask me how I felt. To lose my Mom meant losing my life. I felt I died with her. Many times I wished I had given up, but I knew it would break the promise we made years before she passed away. Therefore, I came back from the dead determined and more spirited than before.