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Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’

Betty Smith

“I wouldn’t want that to get around, Annie.” “You don’t mean that, Carl.” “Ah, we might as well call them beanies, Annie.” “Why?” “When in Rome do as the Romans do.” “Do they call them beanies in Rome?” she asked artlessly. “This is the silliest conversation.
BETTY SMITH

Allow Anyone Around might People
I’ll have a desk like this in my parlor and white walls and a clean green blotter every Saturday night and a row of shining yellow pencils always sharpened for writing and a golden-brown bowl with a flower or some leaves or berries always in it and books . . . books . . . books. . . .
BETTY SMITH

Desk Parlor Sharpened Shining Weekend
It’s a beautiful religion and I wish I understood it more. No, I don’t want to understand it all. It’s beautiful because it’s always a mystery.
BETTY SMITH

Beautiful Believe Jesus More Mystery
It was the last time she’d see the river from that window. The last time of anything has the poignancy of death itself. This that I see now, she thought, to see no more this way.
BETTY SMITH

Grieving Light Poignancy Rivers
The difference between rich and poor”, said Francie, “is that the poor do everything with thier own hands and the rich hire hands to do things.
BETTY SMITH

Differences Hands Rich
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.
BETTY SMITH

Other School Unattainable Worlds
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.
BETTY SMITH

Liar Ragged Sincere Truthful
Bad quarrels come when two people are wrong. Worse quarrels come when two people are right.
BETTY SMITH

People Quarrels Two
How much do they be paying you?” he asked mellowly. “The usual salary. A little more than they think I’m worth and a little less than I think I’m worth.
BETTY SMITH

Salary Thinking Usual
Well’ Francie decided, ‘I guess the thing that is giving me this headache is life – and nothing else but’.
BETTY SMITH

Giving Headache Wells
She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library past and freshly inked stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.
BETTY SMITH

Combined Fleshly Leather Mass Stamping
Oh, I wish I was young again when everything seemed so wonderful!
BETTY SMITH

Wish Wonderful Young
As long as one can suffer, one is living….live and suffer until life is gone.
BETTY SMITH

Gone Long Suffering
Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn New York. Especially in the summer of 1912. Somber as a word was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg Brooklyn.
BETTY SMITH

Beautiful Country Summer
And always, there was the magic of learning things.
BETTY SMITH

Always Learning Magic Things
It’s come at last”, she thought, “the time when you can no longer stand between your children and heartache.
BETTY SMITH

Children Heartache Lasts Longer

Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’

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Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’

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